


Missing Piece of the Puzzle

by StripySock



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Dubious Consent, Dystopia, Mpreg, Multi, Science Fiction, Threesome - F/M/M, violation of bodily autonomy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-18
Updated: 2014-07-28
Packaged: 2017-11-26 00:05:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 38,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/644391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StripySock/pseuds/StripySock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a future event that results in women no longer being able to bear children, genetically engineered Omegas fill this function- if you can pay the price (and live with the consequences). Jared and Genevieve are happily married, and buying Omega Jensen Ackles for the birth of their child seems like the perfect solution. The only downside is that Omegas can't survive the birth of a child- and that by design, they degenerate after a certain age. Not that Omegas <i>know</i> this.</p><p>FINISHED</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Based on this [prompt](http://spnkink-meme.livejournal.com/67017.html?thread=21453769&%20#t21453769)
> 
> Omega is just a word in this, rather than a reference to A/B/O dynamics

It's Gen who gets the brochures, and researches the relevant information. That's pretty much how it always is, she's always been the practical one who doesn't want to jump feet first into something they can't be sure about. The thing is, there's so much choice. Not like twenty years ago- these are not like their birth-Omegas had been. They've all seen the pictures of the hideous melting lumps of flesh that had been their wombs, the wide frightened eyes that were the only human thing about them. They saw the video in class, and Jared had been sick into the herbaceous border that ran along the outside of the building. Gen had closed her eyes tight like most people did when confronted by their history. The teacher had been old enough, to be born from people, not from an Omega, and Jared remembers how stern she was, how she'd excused no-one from watching. This, she told them, this is what we did to survive. Nobody had dared ask her if her own daughter had been born like they had been. The answer was too evident.

 

Now though such strides have been made forward with science, incredible ones. Omegas are almost human, the brochures declare. Genetically modified for every desirable trait, intelligence, beauty, health, everything except the ability to pass on non-defective fertility genes on, and of course the unfortunate time-limit of their existence. There'd been a movement to keep the old style flesh wombs, but Omegas were far far better. Built for one purpose, to have a child, to flower and to die afterwards. Single serving people.

 

Once it had been the state, now private farms had taken over the creation of the Omegas, splicing them and cutting their genes until they were perfection. These days it was about what you could pay- would you opt for the top-end Omega- the one that could speak your language and several others. Beautiful, decorative and capable of bearing twins. Or if you were a little cut-budget, just wanted a healthy child and trusted to luck that your own genes would come out trumps in the genetic lottery, then you could have a Class C Omega, docile, blank, no personality, just a fleshy body that existed to bear your child to pass on all the features that could be desired.

 

There were even a few incredibly flash businesses, where they'd take your own genes and use them to create the Omega, so that everything passed on was your own, not just half. The expense involved was hideous though, the province of movie stars and business people, the incredibly vain, and the self-involved. Gen and Jared weren't fancy or greedy. They just wanted a healthy living loving child between them, to round off their perfect family. A child, son or daughter with Jared's smile and Gen's eyes.

 

Still it seemed a pipe-dream for a long time. Gen was a successful businesswoman, and Jared had just started to achieve some recognition as a vid writer, but although they made more than enough between them, an Omega would drain every one of their resources. So wistfully they'd put the thought aside, though they'd started to save a little more in hope. It wasn't until their seventh wedding anniversary that things changed. Their parents had clubbed together and bought them a Class B Omega to bear them a child. It was a magnificent present, and Gen and Jared could hardly believe it. An Omega of their own, and then a child.

 

So they spend months poring over the information, trying to decide how their money's worth can best be spent, looking over the model types, until they can decide between them. They're a little conflicted at first. Gen wants the Jensen model, she likes his eyes, and she likes that that particular line breeds successfully in almost every instance. Jared leans more to the Cynthia strand whose genes are weaker, less likely to predominate. They haven't yet decided whether it'll be Gen's genetic material they use, spliced in a lab and then inserted into the Omega, or Jared's homegrown method. The overly slick salesman they encounter when they visit the little organic farm they've chosen informs them they can achieve a three-way meld these days.

 

Jared asks why it can't just be him and Gen's genes, why the Omega has to be more than a carrier. The salesman who calls himself Robin gives them the pat rundown- Omega's aren't human, not entirely (as the whole world knows) and without some Omega genes in the mix the foetus will be rejected. It's much more sense to let nature take its course in this small matter at least rather than mess around too much. He concludes with reminding them that their selection of Omegas are outstanding, and Gen nods, taking the sale's pitch at the appropriate value, thanks him and tells him they'll return with a decision.

 

Robin offers a quick visit around before they do so- the Omegas aren't allowed to see anything beyond their carers, but two way glass has been installed in three observation rooms. So they tag around behind him, watch two Omega young ("we don't call them children," Robin says smoothly,) play together with bricks and blocks, dragging them into place and then knocking them down. In the next room, there are three Omega studying plasi-books, and both Jared and Gen are a little shocked.

 

"They can read?" Jared blurts out, a little disturbed at the thought. One of the pros of an Omega he'd thought, was that they only had one purpose.

 

"They have only one final purpose," Robin replies, uncannily mimicking Jared's thoughts, "but we pride ourselves on turning out well rounded Omegas, who are an asset to any family. They're not Class A's, but they are very close to reclassification, so  they're really marvellous value I can tell you. It's of course recommended that an Omega once bought, stays with their host family to ensure the happiness and development of the child. I can assure you a Class C or even a D heaven-forbid, are a nightmare to be around. You have to instruct every action and motion. Our models are self-sufficient to an extent, they have the capacity to learn and to grow. They're invaluable. From your Omega, your child will spring, and there is plenty of research to indicate that a developed Omega as birther gives a child a much better start in life."

 

Gen pokes Jared, and mouths "told you," at him, her own research validated, and he grins back, though he's only half-convinced. He doesn't really like the thought of an Omega around the house, though he's not sure why, and his enthusiasm for this is rapidly draining away. At least it is until they're taken to the third room.

 

Robin pauses before he leads them in, and there's a little bit of a smirk on his face. "The bit most couples want to see," he says. "Our Omegas will give you a child as soon as you desire, but a lot of people are rather fond of keeping them as playmates for a while before availing of that service, since of course once they've delivered the child they're no longer viable." He pushes open the door, and Jared sees exactly what he means. There's a bed, and two fully-grown Omegas are having ultra enthusiastic sex on it. They're both remarkably handsome of course, and Jared is shocked by how much the sight turns him on.

 

"You let them do that?" he asks, a little surprised and more than a little aroused. Besides him Gen shifts uncomfortably, turned on as well, and he gets even harder at that thought. There certainly are benefits it seems to an Omega of one's own.

 

"Of course," Robin says. "They have very high sex drives, though they'll never think of imposing them on you, so they'll always be ready for a bit of fun. They're very well trained I can tell you. Now if you'll come through, I'll show you vids of Jensen and Cynthia. We only ever have one model of each type functional, and you're very lucky both of these two are in the latter stages of their cycle since they're rather rare."

 

Cynthia is beautiful, and Gen spends long moments gazing at the soft fall of her dark hair, and Jared can see her almost changing her mind. Gen does so love pretty things after all. Then Jensen is there, and Jared can't take his eyes off him. Cynthia is beautiful, but Jensen is stunningly handsome, and Gen is staring as well. The brochure had lied- Jensen was far more good-looking in the flesh, taller than he had seemed and well built. Jared moistens suddenly dry lips and looks at Robin who is gazing at them both with satisfaction.

 

After that, it's a foregone conclusion, and the papers are signed by the end of the visit. Robin gives them a stack of information to take away with them, and tells them Jensen will be ready at the end of the week for pick-up. He recommends also that they spend an hour talking with the farm's mandatory counsellor that day, rather than waiting 'til pick up.

 

It's been a long drive out, and Jared and Gen barely need to discuss it. "We'll do that now," Jared says. Getting the formalities over and done with is their main aim. Their own paperwork has already been put through- psych evaluations, DNA analysis, financial checks, this is the last hurdling block. The counsellor's room is pleasantly neutral, the chairs comfortable, and the counsellor herself is welcoming, introduces herself as Franzie. She looks old enough that she might be a pre-Omega-birth, but neither of them would be rude enough to ask. The questions are the ones they've answered already in their psych evaluations, generic ones about how well they deal with separation (easily), how much they want a child (a lot), and then she gets into the meat of the visit.

 

"You know of course," she says with a smile, "what happens to an Omega once they've given birth?" They do of course, everyone knows. They bleed out on the table, or at least they used to. Nowadays a needle slides gently into their neck, and a deadly dose of painkiller is pumped through. In some of the anti-cruelty clinics, they'll occasionally do this before they perform the c-section, to minimise the distress. Omegas can get rather attached to their foetus, especially Class C and Ds who with less intelligence and awareness, seem to associate the baby as being theirs. It's harder for the surgeons though, so generally it happens afterwards.

 

Jared answers for them both. "Yes, we read the material." She seems satisfied with that, but he continues. "It's why they're called Omegas isn't it? They're the end, not beyond."

 

Franzie nods. "You have done your research," she says with another bland smile. "But this is what the session is about. It's possible to get attached to your Omega, and this is quite natural, and not something you should be worried about at all. They can be very charming, very winsome. But you must remember what will happen at the end, and protect yourself. Your Omega is fun. They can be excellent marital aids, they can sometimes be almost human, or act it rather. But in a very real sense, they're built for your child, not for you, and losing sight of that can cause issues."

 

"Like what?" Gen asks, her hand tightening in Jared's. No wonder the counselling session came after the papers were signed.

 

"Not much," Franzie reassures them, "just that, like with a favourite pet, you can experience grief at its life-termination. You just need to remember that Jensen, your new Omega isn't human, however much it can seem like it. He wants nothing more than to give you a child for you to love and raise. Just remember not to get too attached."

 

Jared and Gen nod, a little more subdued, and Franzie rolls her eyes at them. "Cheer up you two," she says. "I do need to give you all the details after all. You're going to have a very good time with your Omega for as long as you'd like to keep him, and at the end you'll have a beautiful child of your own. I suggest you keep a record of your time together if you grow especially fond of him, photographs and film are excellent ways to remember loved pets and Omegas."

 

The session was coming close to an end, and Franzie shuffled through her notes. "One last thing," she said. "And this is very important. Jensen knows he was created to give you a child and to bring you pleasure. It's the aim of his life, and his particular strain is exceptionally intelligent for an Omega, and he will strive to do so in all ways. However he isn't aware of how the nature of that contract will end between you. Knowledge of impending death distresses Omegas, like any other animal. If he becomes aware of how his service will terminate, it'll bring unneeded distress to him, and potentially harm the child he'll be carrying. If at any point he acquires this knowledge, you're instructed to bring him back to the facility."

 

When they got outside, Jared heaved in a deep breath. He hadn't realised how constricted he'd felt inside. Gen was holding onto his hand tightly, and he squeezed back as they headed to the car and she climbed into the driving seat. She sat for a moment with her hands on the wheel, staring at the concrete wall in front of her. "Jared," she said slowly. "Are we sure we're doing the right thing?"

 

He looked at her with surprise. "What's up?" he said. "You seemed really happy inside."

 

She sighed. "I cried for a week when Echo died, you know that. I had to take a day off work because I felt so shitty. I don't want to feel like that again."

 

Jared leaned over the space between them, and pressed his lips to her forehead, feeling her soft hair brush his chin. "Don't worry about it," he said. "We only have to get as attached as we want to. And there's a built in limit as well. You had had Echo since you were a little girl, we're not going to have Jensen nearly as long as that."

 

She smiled at him, a little wanly but still a smile. "You're right," she said. "It just seemed like such a big responsibility for a second. We really are kind of grown up aren't we?"

 

"Speak for yourself," Jared said. "I insist we do something suitably youthful tonight. Have sex outside perhaps, or drive into the city and see a movie."

 

Gen wrinkled her nose at him, as she started the car. "Those things don't go together Jared," she said, but her eyes were brighter now, and her smile less forced, and that was all he'd wanted. He nodded at the dashboard, and gave her a grin.

 

"Go on," he said, with a smile he'd been told was wicked. "You know you want to. And the highway is sort of empty at this time." She eyed him, and he raised his eyebrows at her, already unbuttoning his jeans. "I saw the way you looked at them," he murmured. "You wanted to climb right in and show them how it was done didn't you." Gen's fondness for instruction hadn't gone unnoticed, and it was one of the things Jared found hottest about their already pretty scorching sexlife. Her tongue briefly wet her lips, and she could hardly keep her eyes on the road.

 

Jared continued, voice low. "You're imagining it aren't you? Jensen going down on you, that pretty pretty mouth lingering everywhere you want it most, taking direction so well, like he was born to do it." He watched Gen's thighs press together almost unconsciously. "You could do anything to him," he murmured. "Tell him to fuck you, tell him to fuck me with that catalogue-perfect dick of his, or get him to lie back and let us both fuck him, you pushing silicone into his ass, and me my dick into his mouth at the same time, until he doesn't know what he wants more, to make you come or me."

 

"Jesus," Gen gritted out, remnants of an old curse on her lips. "Fine. Fine, you fucking win Jared." It wasn't exactly often Gen swore, and Jared grinned at the satisfaction of a job well done, as she flicked on the automatic-driver, and the car's AI system took effect, as she clambered off the driver's seat, over the gear-stick. When he slides one hand up her skirt, across her smooth thighs, brushing across the demure cotton panties she'd put on that morning, he's surprised by just how wet she is, how aching for it, runs his hand in wonder across the damp fabric, and she shudders into his hand, pushes against him.

 

"Don't you dare be a tease," she says, and he relents, slides his hand against her stomach, and then down on into her underwear, fingers already slick, and he thumbs over her clit, and she hisses warningly. That's his cue to slide two fingers into her, and he can't resist unbuttoning her shirt with the other hand, as she clenches vice tight around him. It's not exactly often they get to play like this, Gen's not a big fan of voyeurism, despite the fact that seeing another car on the road is unlikely. When her shirt is loose, he gets a hand in, and undoes the bra-strap with ease. (He's been going out with Gen since he was sixteen, she'd have killed him if he hadn't mastered that particular trick) and bends his head to suck at nipples that are too sensitive for much more, feels her muffled moan echo right through him, works his fingers some more, knowing just what she likes, his dick hard under her, pushing through his jeans, feeling her ass against him.

 

Gen's helping out now, squirming out of her shirt as Jared caresses one breast with his hand, getting the same vicarious thrill of his skin against hers as always, and then her swift hands are buried in his hair, and she’s pulling his face up to kiss her again, and they both know how much that turns him on. He’s not sure he can take the teasing, and he’s pretty sure she can’t either. Foreplay is excellent as a concept, but when he gets Gen like this, everything else pretty much goes to hang. He pulls his fingers out, helps her wriggle the panties down her legs, pulls ineffectually at his own jeans, as she braces herself against him. Then, finally, finally she’s sinking onto him, and it’s by turns the most brilliant and the most awkward thing he’s ever felt. Brilliant, because Gen is letting him fuck her in the car as the occasional disapproving car zooms past, awkward because the seatbelt holder is digging into his shoulder, and he can’t get any leverage at all like this. Gen’s dealing just fine with that though, her knees are gripping him like grim death, and she’s holding on so tight he’s sure it’s going to leave marks on his arm, and that shouldn’t be as hot as it is.

 

“You’re going to fuck Jensen like this,” she says, and how the hell is she even coherent enough to form words, is what he wants to know at this moment. He doesn’t say anything though, just listens to her. “Rough, and deep and so hard, and I’m going to watch. Then afterwards you’re going to go down on me until I’m done with you, and you just need to come again so desperately that you’re moaning against me,” and he’s holding her now so tight against her, it’s a miracle she isn’t crushed, hips jerking helplessly up into her, and Gen is doing a fucking awesome job of convincing him that an Omega is going to be an amazing addition to their house.

 

She’s losing her own train of thought now, words gasped out, like she can barely concentrate, high patches of colour on her cheekbones, her hair dark and wild, sticking to her naked shoulders and her face now, and when he slips a hand down between them, until he can feel them joining, she stops entirely for a second, convulsing around him. “I’ll give you a choice,” she murmurs against his ear. “You can get fucked by him or by me,” and even the thought of that, of getting fucked by his wife, who loves him and knows what he loves, and by their Omega who is not going to want anything more than getting them both off is enough to destroy Jared. He’s not even sure how long his orgasm lasts, but when he comes back from it, his dick’s still hard and Gen’s still fucking herself against her, until barely seconds later, she’s coming as well, and all he wants to do is hold her against him, and let this feeling stay. Yeah, he suddenly can’t wait until Jensen comes to stay.

 

By the time the day rolled round to pick Jensen up from the farm, Jared had had time to be as excited about the new addition to their household as Gen was. They'd got his room ready (some people liked their Omega to sleep at the bottom of their bed, ready any time day or night, but it was standard policy to let them have a room of their own if only for the sake of their owners), and looking around it as he fixed a new lightbulb in, Jared thought it was pretty nice.

 

When they arrived, Jensen was dressed in the white loose pants and t-shirt that Omegas from the facility were generally attired in on a day to day basis, and with him was a small bag containing three changes of identical clothing. He was sitting in the reception area, leg jerking nervously as he waited. Jared could see the exact moment that he realised the Padaleckis had arrived- he went limp and relaxed like this was all he'd been hoping for ever and the smile that spread across his face was practically ecstatic. Why wouldn't it be? He'd been told since the moment of his genesis that when he was old enough and ready enough that he'd be given to the perfect family, that he was created for them. And now they were here.

 

He stood and waited for them, hands held behind his back, hope blazing in his eyes. When they'd signed the final transfer papers at the desk, and turned to them, he swooped straight in, bent to kiss Gen on the cheek, then turned his face just a little upwards to bestow a similar salute to Jared's face, the grin back in full force now. "I'm so happy to be with you," he said with direct simplicity. "I can't wait to try my best to make you pleased with me."

 

Gen's face split into an answering smile, as she wound her fingers in Jared's, and he felt any reservations he'd had about this melt away like frost in the early morning sunlight. Jensen's smile was just too contagious to resist in any measure. In the car on the way back, Jared passed him the earphones, plugged him into the car's media system, pulling up the music list so he could listen to what he wanted. Gen was driving again, and she kept shooting these entranced little looks at where Jensen was moving along to the music, staring out of the window like he'd never seen anything like the landscape that rolled past outside, which of course he hadn't. Jared would almost have been jealous if Jensen had been human, as it was, he completely understood the urge to stare at him. He was so _real_ looking.

 

Jared caught his eye in the functionally obsolete rear mirror on his second surreptitious glance and Jensen tugged out the earphones instantly, leaning forward and ready to listen. "You like it?" Jared asked, nodding out of the window.

 

"I can't believe it," Jensen replied. "They used to let us use sims at the farm, so we wouldn't be afraid of being outside in wide open spaces when the time came. But it was usually seascapes or the tropics. I've never seen anything as beautiful as this in my life." Jared could barely believe that- outside dry, dusty, fertili-plant fields stretched in every direction, blue hot skies above, no change in any way, just the same thing repeated. At least until he remembered that Jensen had never left the farm before. If his only experiences with the outside were the 3D simulators no wonder he was so awestruck.

 

He turned away again, and Jensen obediently replaced the earphones until they arrived, whereupon clutching his small bag of clothes and the one vid book he'd brought along, he slithered out of the back seat, and came to a halt to stare at the house that loomed in front of him. Gen tucked a proprietary arm through his and pulled him gently inside. "Let's get you settled in," she said soothingly, as though she were gentling a dog poised on the edge of flight. Jared grasped his shoulder lightly through the smooth cloth, and smiled at him encouragingly.

 

Inside Jensen seemed to relax a little more, and Jared wondered if the Omega wasn't quite as comfortable around wide open spaces as he had seemed to be. Certainly he was looking around with increased curiosity now, though he kept his hands firmly to himself there was certainly nothing wrong with his eyes.

 

There was no awkwardness about the silence, Jared noted absently. It was like Jensen was leaving them space to speak, but not expecting it. He wasn't built to expect anything after all. He just stood there and drank it all in, and it was Jared who broke it eventually. "Shall we take him to his room?" he suggested to Gen, and she nodded.

 

"Unless you're hungry?" she asked Jensen, and the dimples came back into play.

 

"I'm good thank you," he said. "I ate before I left." He followed them up the stairs, fingers trailing along the dark wood bannisters, barely touching it, silent until they reached his room, when as though he could barely contain himself, he lunged in and stood in the small space incredulously as though he could hardly believe it. Jared had thought it was a pretty decent living area, especially since it wasn't like Jensen would have any interests, but the way the Omega was eyeing it was like he'd suddenly been transplanted into Aladdin's Cave, and Jared suddenly ridiculously wished that he'd thought to change the hideous floral curtains and take down the (antique) 'dogs playing poker' poster, a family heirloom that no-one actually liked. Ridiculous because Jensen of all people -omegas- he mentally corrected himself, looked the least likely in the world to complain.

 

"We'll let you get settled in," he said for the sake of having something to say.

 

Jensen glanced at him, slightly puzzled looking and placed his bag in the corner, quickly and neatly lifting out the clothing and settling it in a drawer, then turning and looking expectant as though that were the only possible settling in that he had to do, and Jared kicked himself mentally for slipping up again. He hadn't imagined it'd be so difficult to keep track of exactly how different Jensen was from a human being, though the next few seconds made him wonder how he could ever have forgotten.

 

As graceful as anything, Jensen knelt in the traditional pose- one leg bent, and bowed his head. "How may I serve?" he asked, and Jared looked at Gen for help, who'd been struggling to get the window open. The air conditioning was on the fritz again (hardly a surprise given how difficult it was to source them for older houses these days. Everyone else had the modern inbuilt ones, solar powered for maximum effectiveness, and guaranteed to last for four generations, but Jared's father whose house this had been, had had it grade listed and that meant renovations were near to impossible to get permission for).

 

She looked back at him, and Jared could see her mentally flicking through all the info they'd been given on the (literal) care, feeding and instructing of their Omega. "Uh," she started and Jensen looked at her expectantly, "nothing right now?" she concluded. "I have to make a conference call and Jared needs to get his words in for today." Jared made a face at that. His inspiration came in bursts, starting and stopping pretty much as it felt like, and this was his attempt to self-regulate- getting a certain number of words down every day. Jensen looked disappointed for a second, then the expression smoothed away instantly, and Jared remembered the bit of the manual that had clearly sunk into his brain. Omegas wanted to serve, wanted to make the person who'd acquired them happy, but they were also beautifully and thoroughly trained to obey all orders, and that included being told not to take care of their owners.

 

"Maybe we should get Jensen settled in properly," he said to Gen. About half of it was concern for Jensen, wanting to make him feel welcome and secure, and the other half was prickling into awareness, that a hot and ready for it Omega was kneeling at his and his wife's feet, desperate for them, and that wasn't something he'd ever had before. Like the mind reader she was, Gen picked up on his increasingly dirty thoughts, and licked her own lips.

 

"You might be right," she said thoughtfully. "But I really do need to make this call. How about you take this into the study, and start having a bit of fun while I watch? If you can make me end it early because I can't stand just watching you two without joining in, then you win." She pressed a kiss to Jared's mouth, leaning up against him, and he felt his breath catch at the mental image of Gen on the phone, fingers in her underwear as she tried not to shut the call down.

 

"And if you win?" he said, already determined that she wouldn't.

 

"Then I'll make you call your editor tomorrow while Jensen blows you," she said and her face meant business. He wasn't surprised at the flash of heat that went through him, but he enjoyed every second of it.

 

"C'mon downstairs," he said to Jensen who nodded immediately, perfect dick already half hard under his white pants, and Jared couldn't wait to get his hands on it, and to make Gen regret ever making her bet. Hey, after all he played to win.


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With much thanks to Tipsy Kitty for her read-through and edit!

Gen settles herself at the desk, and enables her implant with a flick of her finger- she'll receive the call straight into her ear, and her throat modification will pick up anything she says. She's kind of old fashioned, has the most standard model fitted, the one you get when you're fifteen or sixteen. Jared has one of the more up-to-date ones where you can sub-delay messages, save them for later, or edit as you're talking if you have access to the main compu-access-point. Still it has all the basic features including an ability to limit the mic completely so whatever Jared and Jensen say won't get picked up. 

 

Jared takes full advantage of this- Gen's sitting on a chair with her legs propped up, and her hand-held in her palm with all the relevant information scrolling across it, and he arranges Jensen accordingly. Spreads him across the sofa, until he's against the dark plasi-leather, a study in contrasts, Jensen's face laughing and excited, and it's kind of weird to remember what a big deal this is to him. Omegas get trained but they don't get fucked except with toys by themselves and their fellow Omegas. This is the first time Jensen will have had proper sex, and there's something unbearably exciting about that thought, even if he's not going to fuck him properly until Gen's fully participating. Gen crosses her legs at the knee as though to pre-emptively anticipate the inevitable, and Jared's eyes follow the tight tug of the designer cover-all against her thigh and she gives him a saucy wink as she speaks clearly 'Crimson Mkinly' and then leans her head back against the moulded chair.

 

Jensen's being patient, barely trembling as he waits, and Jared feels like a hungry man faced with too big a feast to know where to start. "Strip," he says, and his voice is already deeper than usual, turned on so easily by this. Jensen pulls off his white t-shirt with no ceremony, revealing a sculpted chest and strong shoulders that are enough to make Jared's mouth water alone. He's bare, like he's been waxed to an inch of his life, but if the catalogue was right, that's in his genetic code. Round his neck is his ID, on a chain too short to come over his head, and unbreakable. In the round flat disc of metal is every scrap of information about him in case he ever gets lost or damaged. It lies there, flat and silvery against his tanned chest and Jared wonders if that's another genetic trait. Jensen doesn't stop there though, tugs down his pants revealing lean hips, and that apparently the Farm doesn't believe in underwear. His dick is hard, curves upwards towards him and Jared's mouth starts watering in automatic reflex.

 

Last time he sucked a dick must have been months ago, when they'd been at that party in New York, and Olivia had suggested reviving their old group sex tradition. Wasn't like they had neighbours to swing with, and Jared was mostly monogamous by nature however old-style it was, he'd decided long ago. He'd enjoyed going wild again like he was at college, but going home with Gen knowing he had her all to himself had been the highlight of that party. This though, this is different. He's not having sex with another human being, not with anyone he can hurt or piss off, and he gets to have Gen with him while he does this.

 

Jensen strips off his socks while Jared thinks, flexes his bare feet against the carpet, then looks at Jared and lies back, arms above his head, and Jared is done waiting. Sinks to the ground in front of the sofa, traces his thumbs along the sharp definition of Jensen's hips, until the Omega hisses in a breath, bites his tongue like he's done something wrong and Jared is practically done teasing. He licks the head of Jensen's dick briefly, sucks it in, tastes the oddly neutral pre-come that swells up immediately like Jensen is on the edge of tipping over from nothing more than being stared at with what is probably a look that's rather unbearably hungry. Then he indulges himself, sucks at the nipples that've hardened so noticeably, and Jensen is barely able to restrain himself, jerks up for a second, and Jared gets the chance to hold him down with firm hands, feel Jensen subside under them and the resulting uptick in his own arousal. Almost without his knowledge his hands are roaming over Jensen, over smooth skin and taut muscle, partly because Gen loves his hands, loves watching him touch things, and partly because it would be a goddamn sin not to touch something this beautiful.

 

All the while he can hear Gen's voice murmuring in the background, feel the heavy arousing weight of her gaze upon them, and he's half aware that he's arching up consciously for her, allowing her to see Jensen as well, them together, even if he can't see her looking. Then her tone changes, and she says to the people she’s conference-calling, "hold on for one second Crimson and Sendil." He hears the tiny click of her mike going off, and then she says directly to them. "Jared, tell Jensen he's _allowed_ to touch you." That arbitrary half-request goes straight to Jared's gut, and he nods, turns to see Gen who is indeed looking at them, her eyes dark and hot-looking like she's one second away from leaping over the desk to join them. Her mike goes back on, and Jared looks down at Jensen, at the flushed skin of his face, how he's biting those lips like he just can't stop, traces a finger around them, slips it in for a second and feels Jensen's wet lips and clever tongue drawing it in even further, and yeah he can think of a million uses for that mouth and he doesn't think he'd be bored by the end. 

 

"Jensen," he says. "You can touch me," and there's hesitancy in the hands that settle on his waist, slip under the t-shirt and settle on his skin, and he amends that statement. "Jensen," he says, and draws out the word to make Gen shudder with what's going to come next. "Jensen I _want_ you to touch me." Like some sort of switch has been flicked in his brain, Jensen's hands tighten and he settles them around Jared's waist more firmly, drags his fingers against the plane of Jared's muscle just where he is generally the most ticklish.

 

It doesn't make him laugh though, just makes him squirm against the touch, hiss with the effort of not jerking away, a strange mounting excitement in the carelessness. Jensen's hands are tugging at Jared's pants now, slipping in, down against his boxers pressing against his dick, and oh God he looks up, and _asks,_ asks if he can. Jared's kind of going beyond words now, just nods and Jensen pulls his pants down enough that they sit low on his thighs, then with the gentlest of pushes, he reverses their position, ducks his head right down, and begins sucking Jared with more enthusiasm than skill. 

 

When the rare friends they had with Omegas had talked about them, they'd made it sound like male formed or female formed, they were sex gods, that could do everything right without a false step, who felt so good around your dick or sucking on your clit that somedays if you were lazy and didn't feel like work you could stay in bed all day, and just come with them, until you were completely sated, watch how much they loved it. Whatever Jensen is, he's not a sex-god, but he's all kinds of awesome at what he's doing.

 

There's something about how eagerly Jensen tries to take him all (and Jared isn't exactly small) that sparks on something deep inside him, makes him wet with more than just Jensen's mouth, and then Jensen's pulling back and considering, and when he goes down next, he's _better_ and can someone even do that in the space of three minutes? Clearly Jensen's learnable skill-sets include sucking cock, from the messy wetness of his initial attempt, he's now pulled back to focus on Jared's cock-head, is clearly calculating what exactly gets Jared off the fastest, because whenever Jared moans at some especially flirtatious flick of Jensen's tongue, it gets repeated in combo with whatever had worked ten seconds ago as well. 

 

He's barely aware of his hands in Jensen's hair, tugging him closer, needing more of how this feels, but he gets how smoothly Jensen moves, steadies himself with his other hand and takes it all in, his clever fingers smoothing down and around Jared's shaft in the moments that he pulls back for air, slicking him wetly, coating his hand and then sliding his hand between them and tugging so lightly on Jared's balls that it barely registers, except as a hot pressure, and then he's coming, pumping into Jensen's mouth, and Jesus he swallows like it's nothing, and looks at Jared like he's something special, which wrings another few droplets of come out.

When he's back and alert, he sort of wishes he could help get hard again instantly when he sees Jensen, still between his legs, looking up at him with the same hungry look. When he glances downwards he sees Jensen is hard still, and really it might be part and parcel of being made to specification but his dick really is near perfection- long, thick and so hard it's practically against his stomach despite the gravity. When Jensen crawls back, sits up, Jared remembers that he doesn't _ask_ for anything. When he comes, if he comes, is up to them.

 

When he looks over, Gen is staring at them both and he knows that look. She's barely listening to the voices in her ear, or adding responses, and wow it must have hit her hard if she's neglecting her work even a little bit. Eventually she stirs into a response, and Jared is hit with a wicked idea. The thought of Jensen pushing apart Gen's cover-all, sliding it above her knees, pushing it over the smooth skin of her thighs, following up the slow slide of material with his clever fingers, before he tugged her hips closer to him, raised her enough that he can bury his face against her, make her come as hard as Jared just had, makes his spent dick twitch with interest. 

 

She catches that glint in his eye though, and clearly brings the conversation to a close in response to it, which he's counting as a win, but he's pretty sure will end up being a loss to him once Gen's done. Not that getting another blow job from Jensen is going to be a hardship, but retaining enough brain to talk to his editor just isn't going to be possible at the same time. When she's clicked off the conversation, she stands and moves over to the little tableau they've created- Jared sprawled limp and finished, Jensen still resting between his legs. She sits down beside him when Jared raises his head and lets him rest it against her. Jensen stands with one lithe movement, and shifts himself until he's kneeling in front of Gen, like he's asking her to let him do this. She twists a tiny bit of his hair (it's cropped short and close to his head for ease) and widens her legs a little bit. 

 

Jensen takes up the invite eagerly, his hands stroking up her legs, a little teasing and when Jared turns his head a little he can see the touch of awe on Jensen's face, at this, at being allowed to touch, to _please,_ and yeah he can feel himself shivering back into life, not quite hard yet, but getting there. Then Jensen is laying soft kisses on her thighs, his hands resting on them, and Gen full on tremors and Jared can feel that movement run through them. He moves his hand lazily until hers rests in his, pulls it to his lips to kiss briefly, feels her touch his jaw delicately, settle her hand on his neck. Jared can't see exactly what's happening, just the smooth naked swoop of Jensen's shoulders as he bends in close, but he can guess from Gen's muted moans, the way she slides down to give Jensen better access. Imagines the tongue and the talented mouth that had just been sucking him off, going to work on her now, pressing in deep just the way she likes it, sucking at her, then soothing with tiny tongue movements until she presses up into him. 

 

It takes almost no time at all to bring Gen off, she's so excited from watching them, and Jensen kneels there still, licking at her until she can barely take it anymore and has to squirm away, upon which he stops instantly, pulls back and rocks onto his heels, swiping a careless hand across his face. His dick almost looks angry now from the blood flow, and Jared rolls off the sofa, licks his hand and smoothes it along Jensen's dick. Watches the Omega's eyes dilate a little, like it feels too good to be true, jerks him off with calm steady strokes. Gen leans forward to kiss Jared and then to press her lips to Jensen's and it's that which shoves him over the edge, makes him come all over Jared's hands.

 

They sit there panting for a moment like they've been caught up in a marathon, then Jensen stands and leaves to fetch a cloth.

He cleans them both with a peculiar gentleness, and then like some late gesture towards modesty pulls back on his clothing, and vanishes again towards the kitchen. When he returns he's carrying a tray with two glasses and a jug of the cool lemon-flavour water that had been in the fridge, sets it down and pours them each a glass, watches them drink with a smile. 

 

"Do I have to do writing after that?" Jared says, with his face tucked into Gen's side. 

 

She elbows him and not gently. "If I have to take calls on my day off, then you can write some words mister." The old-fashioned endearment is easy and natural between them, and when Jared looks around, Jensen's vanished- taking the tray with him like he knows not to intrude on moments that have nothing to do with him. With a sigh Jared drags himself upright. Technically, he supposes he could just transcribe his words- turn on his mike and have it stored forever on the compu, but it's the one way he's old fashioned- he likes to type most things still. 

 

So he compromises and slouches into the chair Gen had been sitting in, and pulls up the thin flexi keyboard onto his lap, and switches the display from flat to vertical so he doesn't have to lean over. Gen kisses the top of his head, and wriggles her cover-dress down from where it had bunched up around her waist. "Going to have a shower," she said with a smirk, and he waved her off with a grin, as he pulled up the last file and got back down to work. "You should probably check on Jensen," he calls after her and she raises a hand in acknowledgement as she vanishes up the stairs. 

 

Jared was twenty words down into his latest trashy addition to his oeuvre, his brain still like mush as he tried to fight on through, yawning as he went. _This_ was the reason midday quickies weren't a great idea he thought, and his work wasn't inspiring either. He was making a name for himself slowly and surely as a vid blocker and writer, but what sold was lurid romance, action movies and the occasional thriller. Writing the script for 'The Killing Machine Part III: The Reckoning' was soul-draining, trying to make it _romantic_ was just weirding him out. Still it was excellent money, and not the hardest gig he'd ever done. When he'd managed to struggle through a couple of hundred words more dialogue, he saved it and set it aside with a small gesture, and went back to his game save.

 

Alternating between his game, and his work, he managed to get a decent amount done, and by the time Gen called him in for dinner he was feeling more than a little pleased with himself. Gen was dishing up, and Jensen was undoing the lid on the little square box that contained his food- a nutritionally balanced mix of vitamins, minerals, calories and the special blend of drugs that kept his body functioning at an optimal level. Although he could eat normal food, it wasn't recommended- too close to blurring the lines, so instead he ate in the dining room, while Gen and Jared stayed in the kitchen, with a glass of wine each. 

 

"Should he sleep with us tonight?" Jared asked, gesturing towards the other room.

 

Gen wrinkled her nose. "I'm not sure. I don't want him to be alone for the first night in a new house- he might be scared, but maybe he'd like to become accustomed to his own room. What do you think?"

 

Jared considered as he spooned up the last of his sauce. "With us I think. He'd like that." He remembered the look on Jensen's face as he'd come from Jared giving him a handjob and Gen kissing him, and gulped his wine back. Yeah Jensen definitely would like that. He can barely wait for bed-time- kinda like he's five years old again and waiting for Santa to come the next morning, and he thinks from the way Gen's shifting that she can't wait for it either. 

 

When finally they can justify an early night, Gen runs up the stairs to get everything ready, and Jared pops into the dining room, feeling a little bit of guilt for having left Jensen there alone for so long. Jensen seems perfectly happy though, empty packet in front of him, and his head buried in a _book_ of all things.

 

Jared can feel his eyebrows shooting up, though he's not exactly certain why he's so shocked. It was just rather unexpected to say the least. Jensen's head came up slowly as though reluctant to tear himself away from the pages, but as soon as he saw Jared, he beamed, and put the book down carefully as though it was infinitely precious, and gathered up the scraps of his meal. "Can I do anything?" he asked, and Jared shot one last look at the book. It was upside down but he could tell it was _'The Chronicles of a Dying Land',_ one of the last books ever physically printed and bound, written by some environmentalist fifty years beforehand bemoaning what he thought was the world's inevitable fate. The irony wasn't lost on Jared- the book was printed on paper after all. 

 

He didn't say anything about it though, just said "we're heading to bed now." Jensen nodded eagerly and disposed of his things in the kitchen unit before walking sedately up the stairs behind Jared who was still thoughtfully considering Jensen and the book. When he got to the room though, all the thoughts were driven out of his head. Gen had changed into something less comfortable, and put their playbox on one side, the small palm-piece beside it, regulated to both their patterns to provide the longest lasting pleasure. He launched himself onto the bed, careful not to crush her, but placing a kiss on her lips before he stood up again. "I'm going to have a quick shower," he said, and gestured Jensen into the bathroom. Water-shortages years ago had become less prevalent but sharing a shower was the best thing to do still. He kept it short and sweet, though a wet Jensen soaping himself up was nearly irresistible, as was the matter of fact way that he washed _every_ inch of his body. 

 

When they were done, Jared was already keyed up and excited, the faint thrill from earlier bleeding through, and Jensen needed no prompting- he was hard himself already, and Jared remembered Robin saying that the best thing about an Omega was that they were always ready, always willing. Seemed that at least was definitely true. Gen was reading her own book, but she put it to one side when she saw them, shifting on the giant bed that had been their first joint purchase as a couple, until Jared crawled towards her, and kissed her, hot and breathless, feeling her answering response leap up, until she broke away, mouth swollen and beautiful, and got to work on whipping off his shirt. Jensen apparently needed no instructions, shuffled around on the bed until he was behind Gen, bent to kiss her neck, run his hands down her until he could tug up the silk-like long camisole she was wearing, following her every movement, and that sight- Jensen's naked tan body pressed against Gen's lighter skin hit Jared like a punch, and he hesitated unsure of what he wanted the most.

 

There were just too many options, too many combinations and he felt like Buridan's ass, poised between them all unable to make up his mind. Gen solved it for him, squirmed out of Jensen's grasp, who instantly let her go, incapable of even for a second denying her, and twisted a little bit towards him, entwined her hand in his. "Relax," she says, and bites his lip softly. It's kind of weird- they've done this on more than one occasion in the past, but this is different. Jensen is _theirs_ and it's throwing everything a little bit off kilter. He's feeling a certain responsibility to make it good for them all, which is pretty alien to any other time he's done this, and he thinks it might be because he and Gen are responsible for Jensen, legally and morally, they have a duty of care towards him in the bedroom and everywhere else, and that's kind of a weird amount of responsibility. 

 

Gen gets it, like she always does and her eyes go soft for a second. "I want you to fuck Jensen," she says softly. "Fuck him really well, and I'm going to ride him." Jared's not actually entirely sure how those logistics are going to work out for everyone concerned, but he's more than willing to give it a shot. Jensen gets the picture immediately, flops back on the bed and shoves a pillow under his hips to give Jared some space to work with.

He spreads his fingers with lube, wet as he can get them with the stuff, and pushes one into Jensen, can't help watching how easily he opens for it, tilts his hips towards Jared as though in invitation for more, and he doesn't know exactly what he'd been expecting but Jensen feels so real underneath him that it sort of takes his breath away. He can't help pressing in deeper, and then sliding a second one along inside it. He's heard the stories- who hasn't- about Omegas who can self-slick, but that's high-range top-quality modified stuff. Jensen just feels human- tight and hot and easy around him. Jared's so caught up in the gentle movement of his fingers in and out, like some exploration of a landscape he's never thought of that he barely notices Gen steadying Jensen's large dick with one hand, and then easing herself down onto it, until that thought actually sinks into his brain, and he can't tear his eyes away. Jensen's hands are firm and steady on her waist, and he holds her with every appearance of iron strength, until she pushes down herself, swallows him in, and Jared's own cock jerks between his thighs at that thought.

 

Jensen is pinned by Gen's weight now, her small body still sufficient to hold him down, her thighs gripping his body hard as she bottoms out, and Jared can't take it, pushes Jensen's legs apart and slides on in, desperate to join them both. Part of his mind is distantly amazed at how flexible Jensen is- arching up against him, allowing him access, but most of him is consumed by how good this feels. By instinct Jensen's legs have curled around his hips, and Jared can surge forward with relative ease, push inside Jensen and feel how hot he is, and how tight. He's almost overwhelmed, leans forward, and rests his head against Gen's back, feels her smooth warm skin on his, and sucks in deep breaths of air.

 

Working out the logistics takes more than a little bit of wriggling, and Jared can't pull out and thrust back in as hard as he'd like, contents himself with speeding up- small thrusts of his hips as deep as he can get, while Gen controls the action on top of Jensen, levering herself up and sinking back down, her legs locking tight, muscles in her thighs tense, one hand steadying herself on Jensen's chest, as the other slides down around Jensen's cock where it's pressing inside her, and it looks like those hours in the gym were paying off- he hadn't properly realised before just how strong she was. Jensen is arching against her, torn between them both, hips helplessly following as Gen lifts up, then pushing back with the tiny amount of leverage he can get onto Jared's dick, and like Gen he's deceptively strong- when he flexes unconsciously, his hips lift her as though it's nothing. 

 

Jared feels a tiny bit like he's breaking apart when he pushes in as hard as he can, and Gen leans back a little bit and they're pressed together like that. He kisses every inch of her that he can reach, frees a hand to move her hair for her, over a shoulder rather than beginning to stick to her neck, filled with love for her, and a strange blossoming affection for the stranger in their house and bed who is giving them this. Jensen comes first unsurprisingly, the double stimulation he's receiving does its work swiftly, and Gen tumbles over the edge swiftly after that, Jensen's fingers on her clit as she clamps down on his softening dick, and she slides off, lies there beside Jensen, fingers lazily stroking over him, as Jared now free to fuck Jensen properly, pushes in faster to his yielding blissful body until fingers tight on his hips he finally comes.

 

Again Jensen is the first to recover, cleans them both seriously and carefully and Jared wonders if that's what he was taught- not to take a moment for himself, just to care for those who'd been put in charge of him. He doesn't go so far as stripping the bed- Gen had had the forethought to put down towels beforehand, but stands there awkwardly for a moment. "Would you like me to stay or should I return to my room?" he asks, hovering there.

 

"Whichever you like," Gen says drowsily, and Jared elbows her. They're not supposed to give open ended choices. It's not fair. Jensen doesn't seem oppressed by it though, and curls up at the end of the bed almost instantly, taking her on face value. In moments he's asleep, as is Gen cuddled into the curve of Jared's arm. He moves his own feet carefully to ensure Jensen has enough room, and can't help feeling before he drops off that their Omega is a little odder than he'd expected.


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again with thanks to Tipsy Kitty for her time and effort. Any mistakes that remain are my own.

The next few weeks do nothing to change this initial impression. The thing is about Jensen, is that he's nothing like either of them had expected before getting an Omega. Nothing at all. He's everything the leaflets and the brochures say of course. Gorgeous, attentive, and he fucks like a dream come true, and they found all that out all in the first day. It's the extra stuff that's confusing as hell- on top of his excellent qualities he's weird. Jared picks up on it first, because Jared's the one who has always been the more unsure of the two that they should get an Omega in the first place.

 

It starts when they find Jensen in the books. They're technically Jared's but Gen reads them more often- Jared gets his fill of words on a daily basis, whereas Gen finds a sensual pleasure in reading in bed, feeling the pages against her hands. It barely matters what the books are, she's read two hundred year old Star Trek tie-in novels with the same pleasure as the limited edition poetry of Vivianne Anoue. It's become a bit of a thing between them, Gen buys them for Jared, and then reads them out in bed. They aren't exactly expensive items, but it's something intimate, something personal between them, not something most people have any more. Why bother when you can have ten thousand books on a data-pad? Finding Jensen in them is to say the least a surprise. The books that the Omegas had had at the farm, had been of the mass produced plasticated ones, alphabet books, fairytale stories and the like.

 

He's not stupid, they've been warned of that already, although he's more than a little naive, in a way that makes Jared laugh, and Gen run a hand through his hair, and pull him down for a kiss. He asks permission before he does most things, it's something that's clearly been ingrained in him, as deep as anything will go. But books are different. Jared first realises this when he comes across Jensen in the upstairs bedroom where he spends a lot of his time while Jared and Gen work. He's kneeling by the display cabinet, and in his hands he's holding, like it's the rarest treasure in the world, an abridged children's copy of the Three Musketeers, printed in 2031 by Penguin-Random, and he's about forty pages in it, eyes moving like he can't stop reading. When Jared coughs to get his attention, Jensen shoots up and drops the book, and then bends to pick it up, to brush at its cover ineffectually like he might have damaged it.

 

"Sorry," he says, and Jared can't resist that slightly crooked smile, replaces the book on the shelf and kisses Jensen, who instantly kisses back with enthusiasm, winds his arms round Jared, and Jared can't explain the odd little leap of his heart that takes place, when Jensen does that. Everything reasonable tells him this means nothing, that kisses sweet as they are can never be anything real, but they don't feel like that. He breaks away with a last kiss, and Jensen smiles at him again. "I couldn't resist," he says in explanation, gesturing at the book, and Jared doesn't have the heart to say no.

 

Gen catches him the next day, cross-legged in the garden, sun beating down on his head as he devours the final pages of 'The Sergeant's Hello' the worst romance novel she's ever read. Jensen reads faster than anybody she's ever met, like he's afraid something will snatch it away, and as she says to Jared she kinda wonders what the farm must have been like, because she and Jared have never done anything to cause such a reaction. It's the fifth or sixth time, they've found him at it between them, and that merits a discussion they both think. So they ask Jensen to remain in his room a little bit, while they chat.

 

"We're not supposed to let him are we?" Jared said glumly. The heaps of literature that had been downloaded onto their plas-sheets had been very clear on that point. While stimulation of the Omega was admirable and beneficial to a certain extent, beyond that it could be damaging. Keep them at the level of learning they leave the farm with was the general advice, and constant reading wasn't something Class B's did. Jensen seemed to be bucking that trend with relish though.

 

"No," replied Gen, poking at the place mat on the table. "But it can't hurt surely? And it makes him so happy. It seems cruel to take that away from him, when it really is harmless. Perhaps we should just keep an eye on what he reads? Nothing upsetting, nothing that could disturb him. It's probably fine as long as he doesn't read anything new." The implications go unsaid. Books that are printed on paper are pre-Omega, pre-Reformation. They're safe. It's what comes after that could harm Jensen's peace of mind.

 

"I guess," Jared said, doubt heavy in his voice, but the memory of how happy Jensen had looked kneeling on the floor with a book on his knee prevented him from carrying his doubts further. Jensen always looked happy, always smiled but there'd been an extra fascinated gleam in his eyes at that moment, and Jared just couldn't take that away.

 

"Let's sort through them," Gen said. "That way we'll know what he's reading." 

 

As it turned out that was probably quite necessary. The side effect of teaching Omegas that one day they would be given to the one person, couple or group who would be everything they needed in life, is that there wasn't much room for black and white in how they thought. Things were good, or they were evil, and that had been backed up by the short simplistic tales (carefully amended naturally, sanitised for their consumption) that formed the majority of their reading material. It took Gen and Jared a little bit of time before they realised that Jensen viewed most of what he read as _history_ not as fiction, that he didn't understand most of what happened within the pages of most books was untrue.

 

The shock had been something to behold, his jaw had dropped when he realised that The Three Musketeers (and D'Artaganon) weren't actual historical figures had been funny and rather sad, his first response contributed to that. "You mean they're _lies_?" he'd said, forehead creasing as he tried to take that in. "But lying is bad."

 

Jared had been put in charge of trying to explain that one to Jensen, while Gen had tried to stifle her laughs. Patiently, he explained that making things up for entertainment was different from lying, though as a result of the long involved conversation Jensen became an extreme skeptic when confronted with any book at all. Since neither Gen nor Jared had much of an interest in history or in non-fiction books there weren't so many books that came under that heading, so telling Jensen it was all stories wasn't hard. 

 

Like most good intentions though, intending to filter out the books suitable for Jensen's consumption had fallen by the wayside. Since at last count they'd purchased 311 books it was a bit daunting to consider reading through each of them in an effort to remember all the content (they were rather justifiably proud of their collection- apart from major antique collectors most people didn't even bother owning one physical book and many people didn't read at all.) So Jensen was allowed free rein through the three cases that displayed the books, and after a time it became less odd to see him reading constantly- a set of ancient leather bound dictionaries always close at hand for the hundreds of words he had no conception of even, especially since he'd drop them in a second if he thought Jared or Gen wanted him, not even putting in a bookmark to show where he'd left off.

 

And if Jensen began to change, well that wasn't unusual. He might not be a Class A, but he was top tier B and they'd been warned that he wouldn't stagnate, that his capacity for learning and understanding was immense- and geared towards making their Omega owning experience the best. As he'd said once while massaging Gen's feet with a small frown of concentration, he just wanted them to be happy- the happiest they could be. Apparently for Jensen this didn't just involve being the best lay _he_ could be. It meant unobtrusively insinuating himself into every corner of their lives, until Jared found that brainstorming without Jensen in the room was actually harder. He read so much- everything he could get his hands on- that he generally had some quaint idea or solution that he could back up by referencing whichever book he'd skimmed it from, like some ambulatory fiction reference encyclopedia. So when Jared was struggling with Killer Jaws II, it was Jensen with reference to Sherlock Holmes who provided the shark's motivation (after all, the only sharks that existed anymore were the genetically modified ones that swam toothless and harmless so who the hell knew what motivation they had?)

 

And he'd figured out how to fix the air conditioning system in hours, wedged halfway into the house's quite literally antique computer system that ran through the walls, proving that his hands were useful in more than ways than one. With him around things just ran smoother than they had before. 

 

The weeks flew past- they'd acquired Jensen in June, and it was now fading into October, and the inevitable check-in arrived. "Nothing big," said the smooth voice tucked into the curve of Jared's ear. "We just wanted to confirm that your Jensen is satisfactory in every way, and remind you that the deadline for a refund is fast approaching."

 

"Thanks," Jared said, a little more curtly than he'd intended, but then Jensen was curled up at the other end of the sofa, nose deep in 'The Deep Secret of Angapalod,' the trashy fantasy series that Gen had purchased volumes two and four of from a little antique market in New York for a non-birthday occasion, and he really didn't want him to hear any part of this discussion. He made as though to stand up, but with the uncanny knowledge Jensen often had, he was up before Jared, saving him the trouble, pacing towards the kitchen while Jared focused on the conversation at hand.

 

He'd pinpointed the voice as Robin, who clearly dealt with follow-up as well as persuading people to buy the Omegas in the first place, and who gave him a quick run-down of what would be expected at the six month point of ownership. "He's eligible for standard body-mods once you're definitely keeping him," the smooth voice pointed out. "Ear pieces, internal tracking, even the more expensive options if those are wanted- cornea implants, a cortex enhancer for pleasure modes including the feedback kind though we don't recommend that between Omegas and humans to be honest with you. You're also required- you and Genevieve both- to attend a counselling session once again on the 16th."

 

Jared noted it, feeling oddly defensive and prickly though he couldn't have explained why, anymore than he could've explained why he didn't want Jensen to hear the conversation between him and Robin. "Sounds good," he said, "anything else I should know?"

 

"Just that we'd appreciate an update when you start considering trying for a baby. You've got plenty of time of course- three years in total should you choose to take advantage of it, but it's good to start planning now."

 

Jared mechanically agreed, and then put an end to the call with an absentminded touch, feeling peculiarly unsettled. It wasn't that he'd forgotten precisely what Jensen was there for, but it'd drifted to the back of his mind mostly. Still they had time, at least another two years before Jensen started to degenerate, before the impossible-to-conquer degradation of his genes and his body began to happen. For the amount you paid, he couldn't help thinking, you might get a child but you didn't get all that much _time._

 

Later that night while he was cooking in the kitchen, Gen frowning at the screen of her palm-piece, he told her casually the Farm had called, and they had an appointment on the 16th, and she sighed a little with frustration. "I just hope we don't get the same woman," she said, not having taken a shine to their first counsellor. 

 

Jensen was in the obsolete dining room as always, eating his own food, and Jared made sure the door was shut before he continued. "They want us to start thinking about when we're going to have Jensen impregnated." 

 

Gen stared at her hands for a moment. "Not yet," she said softly. "We still have time don't we?" Jared nodded, overwhelmed with relief that she felt exactly the same way. "I'm not ready for a baby in the house yet," she said, "I thought I was but I'm not." It was a blatant and transparent lie- a baby in the house would hardly make a difference and if things got too tough there were also people willing and able to foster for a bit, anxious to have the chance to look after a baby even if only for a little bit of time. But Jared seized on it with relief, and knew Gen relaxed when he did.

 

"You're right," he replied, and felt the pressure lift a little. If Gen had said she did want the baby right now, he didn't know what he'd have done, because he really wasn't ready for this to change yet.

 

That night he tells Jensen to fuck him for the first time, though he's not entirely sure if the two things are related. It's been so long since he's had this, and all he can do is close his eyes and enjoy. He and Gen used to do this occasionally, then Jensen had arrived and everything had been shaken up, their sex life radically altered around the addition of a third factor. He's missed it, he knows that much, cants his hips upwards from where he lies on the bed face down while Gen tilts his head up to kiss him, brings him through it like she always does, the near-pain of being pushed beyond his limits, the push-pull of wanting to pull back from way too much sensation, and forge through into it.

 

Jensen is gentle since it's not like he can be anything else, and it's Gen who changes that, who whispers into his ear what Jared needs. The slick smooth slide of fingers into him is replaced by Jensen's mouth, strong strong hands holding him apart as Jensen pushes his tongue heedless of the lube, only focused on making this as good as it can be, and it is good in a way he had expected and in a dozen other ways beside. He can't describe how it makes him feel to let Gen see him like this rather than being the person doing it to him, or how it feels to know that it's Jensen with his pretty mouth, and inhuman-ness pushing into him with everything he has, rougher and harder now, letting Jared fuck back onto his tongue and then imperceptibly his fingers. It's too much and not enough at the same time, sort of how it feels to watch the way Jensen pleases Gen.

 

When Jared's so hard he's dripping and squirming on the sheets to try and bring himself off, Jensen finishes and nudges up tight and close behind him, solid warmth and adoration in a way that Jared can't think about too closely. It's Gen's hoarse whisper that does it. "Do it," she says, words almost broken, a hitch in her breath as she watches them, a buzzing toy clamped between her thighs (another thing they haven't had much use for,) and Jared wishes he could go down on her, but he's pretty sure that the moment Jensen gets his dick into him, he's going to lose most coherent thought. 

 

Jensen isn't small, and it's been long enough since Jared has done this, that he feels like he's being pulled apart when Jensen finally pushes in. Gen was right though, he loved it like this, feeling every inch, the struggle of his body to resist and then finally relax, how deep it felt when finally Jensen had sheathed himself smoothly. He ruts his own dick against the bed sheets, wishes he'd had the forethought to be on hands and knees for this instead, and then Jensen is pulling him up and back, hands almost unbelievably strong against him, moving him like it's easy, until they're wedged together, Jared supported by his shaky arms and by Jensen, and he can't quite believe this is happening. The only sound he can make out is what he can only describe as a breathless gulp, as Jensen pushes into him with solid little punches of his hips, and Jared just wants more. Squirms back a little until he's got a solid balance and jerks at his dick, adding the raw slipside of it to the sparking thats running through his body. 

 

He lets his head sink, doesn't even try and keep it up, rocks against the penetration disrupting the rhythm of Jensen's strokes but hardly caring, hot hard pressure deep inside him, and he can barely take it. He can feel the pressure building up in him, tugs at his cock faster and harder, wants to come exactly like this, wipe clean the rest of the day, the rest of how difficult everything seems to be becoming so slowly. When he finally gets there, it's like everything's clear for a second, mind wiped of all thoughts as he falls into it.

 

He half expects Jensen to pull out after Jared has come, but he's surprised in this as in so many other things. Jensen just pushes in deeper, right on the edge of too much, overloading Jared's still raw nerves with sensation, fucks him slower now but no less hard until Jensen comes as well.

 

Something about that was different but Jared was too tired, and too fucked out to pinpoint exactly what it was. Instead when Jensen had finished, he let himself flop down with a sigh, and was rewarded by Gen scrambling down to be next to him. "You okay?" he asked her, feeling suddenly guilty. Usually they got off together- they'd fucked Jensen individually of course but only ever rarely, and this was out of their pattern. She curled closer to him, and he felt her smile against his arm. 

 

"Yeah I'm good," she said, "I don't think you know what you looked like with him. Wouldn't want to do it every night, but it was still pretty scorching." 

 

Jensen is following his usual pattern, cleaning up and straightening the room before he joins them on the bed, curling at the end as usual, a warm and heavy weight there, that they barely even notice anymore. He never sleeps in his own room. 

 

The next day is when things start to go to shit though Jared doesn't pinpoint that until long after. It starts when Gen has to fly off for a conference. She can work from home most days- isn't like she needs to see her co-workers to do a good job, and technology means that vid calls can bring people together around the world in an instant. Given the shrinking of the world's population, it's no longer commercially viable to run huge business centres in cities. Sometimes though in a bid to impress, GMs get called in for mass meetings in whichever tropical hot-spot has taken the CEO's fancy. Usually partners are welcome, but Jared's got a deadline coming up and has declined the opportunity.

 

She kisses them both before she leaves, a long kiss for Jared, and a hesitant peck on the cheek for Jensen when she tells him, she'll be back soon. Jared immerses himself back into work-mode, bashing out as many words as he can without compromising the over-all quality. He's so deep into it that the hours fly past, and the only indication that Jensen is there at all is the occasional drinks that appear on the desk from time to time. When finally he comes out of his work-induced daze, he looks round for Jensen but sees nothing. He gives a quick shout but when Jensen doesn't come, he heads up the stairs to the bedroom where Jensen generally hides out with a book when he's not in use or curled up in the study. There's no-one there though, and Jared can't help a frown from creasing his face a little.

 

He searches the rest of the house, even pops a head into Jensen's nominal room. There's no Jensen there, but there is a corner of a book poking out from under the bed, and that's unusual enough to make Jared worried. Jensen cares for books with the same passion that he puts into looking after Jared and Gen in any way that he can. He'd never leave one on the floor. He draws the book out fully, looks at the title with a puzzled frown. 

 

 _'If this is a man,'_ it reads, black text on a white background. No picture, just the title and the name of the author- Primo Levi. He's never heard of it, doesn't remember when Gen had bought it as she must have done. It's certainly not one of the ones she’d read out loud to him. Giving in to curiosity he poked under the bed some more and withdrew four or five other ones, neatly stacked together and pushed to the back, none of the titles familiar bar _The Three Musketeers_ which is the first book he remembers seeing Jensen reading. With a growing sense of unease he puts them up on the small bedside table, and searches through the house some more. It takes a bit of time before he checks out in the garden, where truth be told he hadn't expected to find Jensen. It was surprisingly cold out there, and Jensen in his thin white clothing would be chilled through.

 

Despite that though Jensen's out there, book clutched in his hands, shoulders bowed over it, and it takes Jared several horrible seconds to realise that Jensen is _crying._ That he's bent over the book crying in silence. Any one of the oddities would've been nothing- Jensen liked being outside, and Jared had cried himself a time or two over some of the things that Gen read out to him. 

 

But there's something chilling about this, the combination of the grey sky, the slight cold, the contrast of Jensen in white against the rest of the world as he cries that strikes to his bones, and Jared doesn't leap forward. Jensen isn't sobbing, if Jared hadn't been close enough to see the tears he wouldn't have thought anything was wrong, it's like the tears are just running down his face as he turns the pages, an organic expression of feeling. When he finally steps forward, Jensen hears him almost instantly, and almost drops the book in fright. He swipes his arm roughly over his face, and stands instantly. "I'm sorry," he says helplessly, as though he doesn't know what he's apologising for.

 

"It's okay," Jared says, and takes another cautious step forward. This isn't covered in the manual- no one has ever told him what he has to do if an Omega starts crying, and he wonders if the subject has ever even come up before. "Why were you crying?" he asks, doesn't put his arms around Jensen, feeling alien and alone all of a sudden, as though Jensen's tears had tapped into some fear Jared had inside himself, that he can't even name, deep and persistent though it was. 

 

"Is it real?" Jensen asks, extends the book he's been reading towards him, and Jesus Jared recognises the books now. He'd bought them for Gen, a rare switch-up of their usual pattern, on some online house-auction site, under the impression that he was buying some cheesy romance novels, only to discover when they'd arrived that actually they were mostly historical books- ten of them, and pretty grim reading, covering material that was generally unknown now unless you were a historian. All the wars and petty fights of the past kind of blended into one as compared to the enormity of the Reformation after all. Humanity had done terrible things, but when faced with complete and utter extinction all else had faded. 

 

Now he's faced with an Omega asking him if it's _real_ and he doesn't know how to explain the past when he barely knows anything about it himself. He's seen some of the media pieces, knows dry names of wars (from World War I, World War II, the Iraq War, the Iran conflict, the Coalition, the Chemical War and all the rest) but details elude him. He tries for sensible. "What are you upset about?" he asks instead. "What did it say?"

 

Jensen shrugs, like he doesn't have words to explain, looks down at the book in his hand. "It's terrible," he says quietly. "Did people actually do that? Did they actually lock people away because they were different and then kill them?"

 

"Yeah," Jared said, fumbling for words. "They did I guess. Look Jensen, it's not worth upsetting yourself over. It was over centuries ago, people don't do things like that any-more." He steps forward tugs the book gently from Jensen's hands. "Honestly," he says, "that was a shameful time for the world, but we'd never do anything like that again to anyone." He doesn't know how much it helps, but Jensen visibly settles himself, wipes across his face again, and comes back indoors, lets Jared put him near the heater to warm through, and drinks something hot, though he doesn't pick up a book.

 

The rest of the day is quiet;- Jared manages to get his project finished, then gets through to Gen on the compu rather than just through his earpiece, so that Jensen can say hi as well. He knows the instant that she sees them, that she can tell that something's wrong, but he smiles at her still, lets her know silently he'll tell her when she returns, and Jensen is nothing but smiles, asks her if she's liking the weather, and listening with interest to her description of the hotel.

 

That night, Jared misses the warmth of Gen beside him, feels oddly cold and alone in bed even just for the one night, and pulls Jensen up to sleep beside him rather than at the foot of the bed. Imagines Gen snuggling in, around them both and feels his heart gripped tight for a moment in a way he can't think about too closely. When Jensen falls asleep easily, Jared murmurs on the small light and picks up _If this is a man_ and begins to read. By the time he's too tired to finish, he wants to cry himself though he doesn't understand why.

 

When he wakes up the next day, it's to Jensen's soft breathing, and radiating warmth, and he doesn't want to move from the bed at all, would stay in all day if he could get away with it, curled up beside Jensen, waiting for Gen to come home. But then he shifts, and the spine of the book from the night before pokes him in the back, and the heavy rush of sadness returns and it's not something he can deal with, not right now, so he buries his face against Jensen, breathes in deep and tries to forget about it. To remember what he'd said to Jensen- it was done with, so far in the past most people didn't even remember that there had _been_ a World War II let alone what had happened during it. It failed to convince though, and with a resolute hand he knocked it off the bed. It might have been a present but that wasn't going to protect it from being thrown away.

 

Jensen shifted at the movement, and opened his eyes sleepily. "Morning," he said, and Jared felt better already at that, and even more so when Jensen's hand found his morning hard-on. 

 

"Morning," he murmured back, arching a little into the touch, enjoying the slowness of it, the care with which Jensen always touched him. "Sleep well?" he asked as Jensen licked his palm and sped up his strokes, always knowing the best, the fastest way to get him off.

 

"Uh huh," Jensen replied, clearly distracted as he brought Jared off in an almost embarrassingly short amount of time, ducking down before the end to swallow the resultant come in a way that had Jared almost laughing at the forethought. 

 

"You _really_ don't like wet patches do you?" he said, and Jensen grinned at him, flopping back down beside him, unselfconsciously hard himself now in a way that Jared couldn't help but notice, even though Jensen would never purposely bring it to his attention. With lazy touches he made him shiver and fall apart in a satisfyingly short amount of time. Afterwards when they were finally up, Jared went into the kitchen to make breakfast for himself, and set out Jensen's food-stuff for him. When Jensen picked it up to carry into the dining room as usual, Jared stopped him. “You can eat in here if you like,” he said, feeling obscurely embarrassed. Jensen blinked at him, but sat back down to spoon it in. It looked disgusting, but Jensen ploughed his way through it eventually, and looked at Jared.

 

“What do you want me to do today?” he asked as usual, clearly expecting the usual ‘whatever you like.’ 

 

Jared shrugged. “I thought maybe we could talk,” he said uncomfortably. 

 

“We do talk,” Jensen said, not arguing but puzzled. 

 

“I know,” replied Jared, finding it difficult to explain what he meant. They did talk, but never about Jensen. They talked of plot points between them for Jared’s thriller pieces, and Gen batted back ideas with him, and they both liked explaining what should be the obvious to an intrigued Jensen, and of course there was always sex. But Jensen himself was just there on the outside of it all. “I wanted to ask you about before you came here.”

 

Jensen’s brows drew together instantly. “I’m not supposed to talk about it,” he said, and managed to make even that flat no sound charming and apologetic. “I’m happy to be here, I’m happy that you picked me to give you a child, and that’s all there is to tell.”

 

Jared pushed on though he wasn’t sure why. “Please Jensen, I really want to know.” He looked straight at the Omega, feeling bad for doing this but knowing that Jensen couldn’t prevail against being asked so directly. He was surprised when Jensen twitched his gaze away, and refocused somewhere else, mouth still stubbornly closed. “Did something bad happen to you there?” he said, feeling his way through the conversation.

 

Jensen looked back at him, and Jared was unnerved by the sudden depth of the feeling there, the way that Jensen almost laughed, the side of his mouth twitching up. “No,” he said briefly. “It was absolutely fine,” and Jared is reminded strongly once again and not for the first time that Jensen _isn’t_ stupid in any sense of the word. He’s naive and trusting, but he isn’t stupid. This _is_ the first time though, that that knowledge doesn’t please him but sets off an aimless kind of dread. All he can think about is the books under Jensen’s bed, the worn one lying beside their shared bed upstairs, and the tears on Jensen’s face. 

 

These are the perils of being a writer he thinks, and tries to laugh it off as an over-active imagination. He's building a mountain out of a mole-hill, blowing it out of proportion in his mind as though there was something that he was missing. Jensen is drinking back his water now, purposefully not looking at him, and Jared feels a sudden irrational annoyance at him. "If you won't tell me what it was like there," he says, knows he sounds almost petulant, "what _do_ you want to talk about?" He watches the faint flicker of hurt wing its way across Jensen's face, and the conflicting emotions it leaves in its wake. 

 

"Anything you want," he replies smoothly, having clearly decided that descending back into strict protocol is the way to deal with Jared behaving like a child. He folds his hands together, and tilts his head to one side to look at Jared. "We can talk about your book if you like?" he says it with a smile that isn't reflected in his eyes.

 

The words are innocuous, the intent isn't. Only Gen knows about that book, buried beneath a thousand other projects, a ridiculous and stupid attempt to replicate an art-form that was practically lost these days- no money in it after all. Well and apparently Jensen now, and Jared's pretty furious at that. Jensen isn't allowed near the compu, that's in the terms of the contract that Jared and Gen had signed. He's never to be given access to the net, to a compu-point or to anything that might lead him to knowledge of exactly what he is. In fact they were negligent not to have voice-locked everything against him. "How do you know about that?" he asks, tries to keep the anger out of his voice. Jensen's clearly still shaken from yesterday, and Jared should make allowances for that he knows, especially when this is his fault anyway.

 

"Lucky guess," Jensen says, and with anyone else Jared would have said he was being snide. Jensen didn't lie though, not ever. Number one rule drilled in deep. Omegas don't lie. Jared relaxes. If Jensen says it, it's true, and he lets the anger drain away, though he's still a little pissed. 

 

"I don't want to talk about it," Jared says, aware now that he's the one on the back foot. Jensen is moving around the kitchen area now, back tense and straight as he tidies the few things away. It's bizarre having this kind of tension between them- Jensen's been with them for months and it's never happened before, there's never even been the most minor hint of conflict. If he'd been asked before this, Jared would have said it was impossible. He wonders uneasily if this is normal, but he's never even heard of this in the past, and he thinks it might be something to ask the counsellor when Gen returns from her trip. 

 

The rest of the day is strained and awkward, on Jared's side at least. Jensen behaves exactly the same as always- endlessly helpful and precise, sticks around close rather than vanishing out of the room, like he doesn't even notice there is anything wrong. 

 

That's the start of it, that day. Jared can't look at Jensen the same way anymore, and his unease translates itself to Gen when she comes back, a little bit tanned and revitalised and hugs them both. Jensen without any bidding goes to his room afterwards to let them talk, polite as always, and Jared tries to explain to her what the problem is. Gen listens like she always does, forehead wrinkling as she tries to take it in.

 

"You mean he just wouldn't say?" she asks eventually, looking troubled. "Do you think I should ask him?"

 

"It wouldn't do any good I think," Jared replied, "he just didn't want to say. He's been told not to, and I know we've been told not to ask, but I was curious." Gen ruffles her hand through his hair, stretching up on tiptoe to do so.

 

"Curiosity killed the cat," she reminds him dryly, the old-fashioned phrase making him smile, as he finished the tag.

 

"Satisfaction brought it back," he pointed out, and pulled her close. "I think it should just be us tonight," he said into the side of her neck. "A proper welcome home."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That brings the story up-to-date in terms of what has been written. Feedback much appreciated.


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With thanks once again to Tipsy Kitty!

She nestled in a bit, then pulled away to look at him. "We can't solve this by ignoring it," she said. "If there's a problem with Jensen we have to get it fixed before this visit to the farm. He's got to come with us and have his own check up, remember, and the warranty works two ways. If there's a problem, they have the right to withdraw him and replace him with a different model. So, if we want to keep him, we'll have to sort this out."

 

"Yeah," he said, and broke apart to head for the sofa.

 

Gen stood where she was, looking at him. "You do want to keep him, don't you Jared?" she asked, striking right to the heart of what he was worried about.

 

"Of course I do!" he replied heatedly. "It's just complicated I guess. I didn't think we'd be having problems like this."

 

With a sigh, she moved closer and perched on the back of the sofa, hand falling onto his neck and stroking gently. "I think we should take him as he is," she said quietly, "we both like it, you know that. We can't freak out because he's different than we expected."

 

Jared gave a nod. "You're right. Do you want to smooth things over with him?"

 

"Sure," she said. "And I'm going to mention to him that he probably shouldn't say anything about this at the Farm. That'll be for the best."

 

//

 

Driving back to the Farm gave enough of a surreal flavour to the day itself- the last time they'd driven along this road, they'd been bringing Jensen home. Now they were on their way back for their final confirmation that he was theirs permanently, and the atmosphere was to say the least tense. They'd opted for all automation on this occasion, and Jared was desperately wishing he'd opted for driving as some distraction. Gen looked calm beside him, but her knee was jerking nervously and Jensen in the back was looking out the window rather than at either of them.

 

Once they'd stepped inside, they were separated off quite fast, Jared and Gen being taken to Franzie straight off by Robin, and Jensen being left in the reception area. It wasn't customary to let Omegas visit their old fellows, the need to keep those who had not yet been picked in isolation from the world was essential, and the other resident in-house counsellor was on lunch break it seemed like. 

 

Inside, the room was the same neutral beige that it had been before, and Franzie was exactly the same as well. Not for the first time, Jared wondered why she hadn’t opted for the popular anti-aging shots that most of the rest of the population started sometime around their twenties or thirties. Not that they expanded your life span at all, but _looking_ and feeling young, if not being young, was something most people wanted. Jared had decided not to start his own until thirty so he had another year yet, and Gen was still in the process of making her decision. Franzie however had clearly chosen to let her years show, and Jared found himself distracted by the sight as she caught up with them on how Jensen was working out for them. Gen gave him a nudge in the side, tired of carrying the conversation as best as she could alone.

 

“So everything has been going fine?” Franzie said, making a small note on her palm-piece, in addition to switching her mic on.

 

“Great,” Gen replied with a smile. “Jensen is everything we hoped for.”

 

Franzie switched her attention to Jared, and he sat up straighter under her unexpectedly penetrating gaze. “What about you Jared?” she asked. “Are you as happy with Jensen as you’d expected? I know you had expressed an initial preference for the Cynthia model.”

 

“Happier than I’d expected even,” he answered- an honest answer as far as it went. Part of him wanted to ask Franzie about all the anomalous bits of Jensen’s behaviour, but the rest of him remembered what Gen had said about the facility retaining the right to withdraw defective models, and an instinctive wariness kept him from mentioning any of it. Shifting under her gaze he found himself blurting out. “He’s lovely.”

 

That was clearly the right answer judging from the smile she gave him. “Excellent. He’s completely satisfactory then?” 

 

Jared nodded, and Gen answered. “One hundred percent,” she said brightly. “We’re so lucky to have picked him.”

 

Franzie asked a few more innocuous questions and Jared was just beginning to relax, when the most pertinent one was asked. “Have you decided when you’re going to conceive?” 

 

“No,” Jared said, and shifted on his chair uncomfortably, knowing how final that must’ve sounded. Franzie’s eyes narrowed and he elaborated a little more. “We’re interested in keeping him a little longer. It’s a very expensive investment after all, and it’s nice to get full usage from it.” As though he’d suddenly blanked out for a moment, he actually listened to what he was saying, and was overcome with a strange unrealness like it wasn’t actually him saying that. It felt wrong to talk about how expensive Jensen had been, as though he were boasting about a new chair or something. When he glanced sideways to see if Gen had spotted anything off, her face was turned away from him, and he could only see the fall of her hair, dark against her skin. “Yeah,” he finished, suddenly uncomfortable. “We’d like to take our time.”

 

“Very commendable,” Franzie said briskly, but her eyes were cool as though she’d sensed some of his doubts. “Do bear in mind however that there is a time limit for a reason. The longer you wait to conceive, the closer Jensen will come to the end of his working life. It’s been almost six months, and as with all pregnancies the child will gestate for nine months. Which of the three year total that Jensen had left when he came to you, leaves you with just over one and a half years, and that’s if you cut it so fine that you’re right up against the wire, which we certainly do not recommend.” Jared nodded, unsure of what to reply. 

 

“We understand,” Gen said, and her voice was definitely not as polite as usual. “But he is our Omega now, and I think it’s for the best if we decide when the most appropriate time is for our child to be born.” The room was silent for a bit, Gen not backing down at all in the face of Franzie’s clear irritation.

 

“We’re the experts,” Franzie said finally, when it became clear that Gen wasn’t going to soften that initial assessment. “It’s our job to give you all the facts and advise you at this exciting time of your life. Not to mention we’re the ones who will be ensuring that the pregnancy happens at all.”

 

“We know, and we’re grateful,” Jared cut in, before Gen could reply. He flashed his best smile at Franzie hoping she’d believe him. “It’s just, you know how it is. We’d like some time with him before everything comes to pass.” Franzie seemed to accept his words, and continued on with the session, mostly reiterating things they’d heard before. 

 

Finishing up, she looked at them both. “Remember,” she said, “any problems we’re here to help. If you feel like you’re getting too attached you can always request additional sessions with me, or call if you have any questions.” She gave them both a professional smile, and Gen was up on her feet in an instant.

 

“Thanks,” she said. “We really should be going now though.”

 

Franzie’s eyes shot to the clock which still showed ten minutes left of the hour. “We’re not quite done yet,” she said, but Gen had her hand on the door and Jared was right behind her, leaving the counsellor gaping with disapproval. 

 

Gen was halfway down the corridor when Jared caught up with her, put a hand on her arm to calm her down, and she twisted it away from him. “I really really don’t like her,” she said, and with a shock Jared saw she was close to tears. This time when he pulled her in there was no resistance at all, and he tucked her head under his chin for a long hug, unsure what to say. He never saw Gen like this- of the two of them she was generally the most calm and collected. Before he had to ask though she told him. “I just can’t stand her,” she said. “She makes me feel like we’re doing something faintly wrong. It’s all so clinical, but it’s like she’s slopped TCP over something disgusting.”

 

He hadn’t been able to articulate it until that moment, but Gen had described exactly how he felt after talking to Franzie, and he hugged her closer. “I totally get what you mean,” he said;- “C’mon, let’s go get Jensen and head off.” They made their way back to the reception area with ease, where Robin appeared in seconds with the second hard copies to sign. “Where’s Jensen?” Jared asked, scanning the room.

 

“His checkup isn’t quite done,” Robin said brightly. “You two were out a little earlier than expected. No worries, that gives us time to have a bit of a chat. How are you doing with Jensen?”

 

“We’re good,” Gen said cautiously, “he’s everything we’d expected.”

 

“Good, good,” Robin said with a smile, and turned to Jared with a raised eyebrow. “Everything you hoped he’d be, Jared?” he said, and just like that the thought flashed into Jared’s mind _he’s pumping me for information._ Everything about that thought was ridiculous, he knew, from the pre-war phrasing that sounded like something out of one of Jensen’s books, to the idea that _Robin_ would want information from them. It wasn’t like Jensen was some sort of state secret after all. Still, it made him more cautious than he would’ve been otherwise, especially freed from the restraint of Franzie’s presence. _Good cop, bad cop,_ he thought ridiculously, but couldn’t shake the image. 

 

“Fantastic,” he said, brightly in return. “Couldn’t hope for more, and looking forward to the child.” Robin’s smile widened.

 

“That’s great news,” he said. “Can I offer you two a drink of some sort while you wait?” They both declined and he disappeared to whisk the papers away. 

 

Jared called out after him. “Robin, could you do me a favour?” 

 

Robin stopped to look back. “Of course,” he said with another smile.

 

“I know you gave us the short form contract duplication, but our lawyer wants a full copy of the contract,” Jared improvised. “Said he needed it for his records, and for the tax forms. Some legalese or the other.” He wasn’t entirely sure that Robin was buying it for a second.

 

“Sure,” Robin said with only a second’s hesitation. “Give me his ID number.”

 

Jared turned to Gen praying she wouldn’t question this, and would pick up the ball. He felt stupid for even thinking that though as she leaped in without even a little pause, and whipped out her palm point. “Oh,” she said after a second of staring at the screen, “that’s ridiculous,” and she looked quite genuinely annoyed. “Server is down,” she made a face at the palm, and an apologetic grimace at Robin. “Sorry,” she said, “can you slide it to mine, and I’ll slide it on to him when we get home to the fixed point?” 

 

“No problem,” Robin said easily, and accessed the database on his own and then replicated the results and forwarded them to Gen. As he finished the door opened and Jensen came out and across to them. Jared and Gen stood up, and Robin waved a friendly goodbye as they left. 

 

Once in the car, Gen glanced at Jared. “What was that all about?” she said keeping her voice low, even though Jensen was wearing headphones.

 

He shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said honestly, “I just want to have a look at it. What was with you and Franzie?”

 

“I really don’t like her,” Gen said fiercely. “Not in the least. Seriously, if I’ve never got to see her again it’ll be too soon. Jensen might not be-be like us, but she refers to him like he’s this tiny footnote and it just pisses me off okay?” She hunched her shoulders a little, and looked out of the window. 

 

The rest of the journey was conducted mostly in silence, and when Jared glanced behind him, Jensen’s eyes were fixed on them both thoughtfully. It was an odd look, and Jared had had most of the oddness that he could stand for one day at least, and turned away to ignore it. When they got out of the car, he stayed behind to grab the additional box of food that they’d been given for Jensen, and to hang up the headphones that Jensen had left on the seat absentmindedly. As he went to tuck them back in though (wasn’t like they’d ever got used much- both he and Gen had the standard ear mods) he noticed something odd. There was nothing on the playlist that flickered in the inset panel. Jensen had been listening to dead air. 

 

Or, and the thought struck him like walking into the cold night air. To Jared and Gen talk. He dismissed it impatiently. They hadn’t been talking about anything important. _But you could have been_ a small voice said inside him. It was just luck they hadn’t been more explicit about their worries. He brushed the thought aside, he was getting paranoid and seeing plots anywhere. Why would Jensen want to eavesdrop on them anyway? 

 

Carrying the box inside, he found Jensen setting the table for two in the kitchen, humming to himself quietly, as he straightened out the cloth. Fancy, Jared thought with surprise. They usually ate casually. Gen bustled up behind him and gave him a peck on his chin. “Sorry for being such a grump earlier,” she said with a smile. “Let’s just have a quiet night in hm?” He acquiesced easily, and brushed a kiss on her head in return. “I’m going to make dinner,” she said, a certain grim look in her eye.

 

“I’ll do it,” Jared said. Gen was talented in a lot of things, but electrical appliances had a difficult time around her, and she gave him a grin.

 

“Deal. I’ll open the wine.” She was hunting for the old wine opener, when Jensen headed for the cabinet where they kept the glasses. When he stretched out for them, his sleeve rolled back, showing a small square of white attached to his arm on the curve of the elbow. 

 

“What’s that?” Jared asked, nodding at it, and Jensen pulled his sleeve down.

 

“Sorry,” he said contritely. Small wounds and injuries were pretty disgusting and not something you’d expect to see much of- if they happened you kept them private and hidden until they were healed, and Jared shared the universal distaste at the thought, feeling a little sick even at the sight. “I had my check up today to make sure I’m healthy, and they gave me a couple of injections.”

 

“What for?” Jared asked.

 

Jensen shrugged his shoulders. “No idea,” he said. “I asked but the answer was something about vitamin deficiency.” Jared felt slightly stupid for assuming that they’d tell Jensen anything. Jensen set the glasses out, and picked up the small silvery packet of his own food, and emptied it into a bowl placing it on the side until it was time to mix it with water, and Jared felt his eyebrows raise.

 

“Is everything okay?” he asked. “I thought that stuff was meant to give you everything you needed. Vitamins and that sort of thing. Do you need some more supplements or something?”

 

Jensen gave him a slightly bemused look. “I’m sure everything is fine,” he said but there was something about him that sounded unconvincing. “Seriously,” he said, “they’d let you know if something was wrong,” and the unspoken _‘not me, so why are you asking’_ hovered in the air, though Jensen was far too polite to say anything of the sort. 

 

“You’re right,” Jared said, and got back to the food, catching Gen’s eye for a brief second- she’s heard everything that’s been said. Conversation between them over dinner was still stilted and awkward, both of them uncomfortably aware of Jensen sitting in the next room eating his own dinner, and Jared didn’t know how to articulate everything that he was feeling without sounding like he was paranoid as hell. He had nothing to go on, nothing but a vague sense of unease, and he didn’t even have a clue whether there’s anything to be wary about or- if there is- what on earth it could be. 

 

The mood was still subdued when they shifted into the front room, and Jensen sunk down to the floor in front of the sofa so easily, staring with fascination at the entertainment unit that covers most of one wall. They’re not a very media oriented household- Jared lives in fear that they’ll end up watching one of the terrible thrillers that he’s scripted in his time- but tonight he welcomed it, anything to break up the awkwardness between the three of them, that shouldn’t even be there. There’s no time to think about that though; Gen chose to randomise the selection, and luckily the first thing that popped up was some generic action vid that Jared had never seen let alone written. He fell asleep easily to the sounds of non-harmful gunfire, the shouts and calls of the actors on the screen, and woke up to the action hero rescuing the heavily pregnant Omega from the rampant criminals who were trying to hold it hostage, Jensen was watching in fascination still, Gen’s sleeping hand curled into his hair. Still half asleep he watched the end sequence, the loving couple happy to have their baby back, the passionate kisses they exchanged, the degeneration into the standard soft porn sequence, and couldn’t help in his sleep honest state wondering why they’re so grateful. 

 

They got their Omega back, but at that sort of stage of pregnancy it’s not exactly going to be for long. So the joy and relief at his safe return is for the baby, not for the Omega, and something about that hit Jared coldly and deeply in the heart for reasons he couldn’t even explain. Soon, he knew, soon Jensen will be gone and they’d have a baby of their own, and he couldn’t explain why that thought hurt so much. So he shoved it aside, and shook Gen awake gently- he’d carry her up the stairs but she’d probably wake up and panic half-way up, and she sighed into his arm before stretching. Jensen tucked right down into the bottom of the bed like he usually does, and though Jared hadn’t pushed the issue since Gen got back from her trip, tonight he really felt like he needed Jensen to be close to them both. 

 

So he tugged him up, and thanked thin air that they had a bed easily big enough for the three of them. Jensen made no protest, just snuggles down in between them, turned his face into Gen’s hair and fell asleep instantly. Jared took longer to fall asleep, surprising given how tired he was, just stared into the dark space of the room, and stroked his fingers down Jensen’s arm, stopped each time he comes to the small plaster, ran his fingers over and around it, weirdly repulsed and fascinated by it at the same time. Underneath that small square, blood circles as Jensen’s heart beat and pumped it around his body, Jared knew that much. They’d stopped teaching biology in school, long before he went, but he’d picked up basic general knowledge and he can apply that to Jensen’s body, to Gen’s and to his own. Blood pumps through them, takes oxygen to their cells. Underneath they’re all the same, the rich red you never see if you can help it. He fell asleep, fingers still circling Jensen’s arm.

 

When he woke up the bed was empty, but still a little warm, and he rolled over to spread himself out fully and enjoyed being able to stretch after a night spent curled around two other people. He wasn’t given long to enjoy the space though, or the quiet either as Jensen appeared, carefully bearing a cup of coffee in his hands and watching with a smile as Jared drained half the cup with a long groan. When Jared was done (in about three swallows- the heat really doesn’t bother him), Jensen plucked the cup from his hands and kissed him, deep and hard and long until Jared was gasping and turned on, and really not sure why that suddenly came up. Jensen seemed to read his thoughts, let his mouth curl in a secret smile. 

 

“Gen said to say good morning in an appropriate fashion,” he said, following it up with another kiss that had Jared tugging him down onto the bed and rolling over on top of him in an effort to keep him there, all the awkwardness and strangeness of the previous day forgotten in the living breathing reality of Jensen there beside him, smiling at him fit to break a heart. 

 

“What’ve you been up to?” he asked, not really caring as he kisses his way down Jensen’s neck, couldn’t resist running his fingers down the warm strength of Jensen’s body, at least not until he saw the look Jensen was giving him, the rather smug smile and he hadn’t even known an Omega’s face could show that particular emotion, and he _got_ it finally. “You and Gen,” he said rather stupidly, overwhelmed with how hot that particular idea is, and Jensen grinned at him wider. 

 

“She said you’d like it,” he said, rocked slightly against Jared, dick already hard after whatever he’d been doing with Gen, and Jared almost didn’t dare ask, afraid that in his already aroused state he was going to embarrass himself by coming just at the description. Gen had guessed right that this would be up his street, the mental images flooding across his mind are almost paralysing him with the subsequent hotness. They were grinding against each other now and if Jared had had a little more self control they could be doing more, but he really didn’t care at this moment in time, all he could think about is getting off exactly like this as fast as he can. 

 

He couldn’t even tell what time it is, the soft grey light flooding in through the window gave him no clue either, but it feels perfect just like this, in the coolness of the room and the warmth and the bed- the heat of Jensen against him, rocking upwards lazily, and when he managed to get a hand in between them it was almost a shock to feel them together against each other. It felt fantastic, but it’s not until he got a good look at Jensen up this close, light laugh lines creased around his eyes as he smiled that he came.

 

He doesn’t really want to get up after that- it’s only the second time it’s happened but it already feels a little bit like a habit, but Jensen is possessed of obscene amounts of energy, even after what is presumably his second orgasm of the morning. He’s up like a shot, collecting the mug and picking up the clothes from the floor to drape on the bed. Now that he’s pulled his pants back up, he looks almost decent if it wasn’t for the rustled mess of his hair and his flushed face as he heads back downstairs. Jared wishes he had a tenth of the same energy, and wonders how tired he’d be right now, if he _hadn’t_ drunk the coffee. Smart idea of Gen’s that one. Eventually he managed to get up and have a quick shower before he headed downstairs. Gen was in the study working, and Jensen was sitting crosslegged on the sofa in the same room, head bent over a book. Since Jared had found him crying he’s been less likely to sneak off and read his books, and the small pile that had been under his bed had disappeared, though they haven’t yet appeared back on the shelves. 

 

As he passes, Jared sneaks a peek over his shoulder to try and catch the title, and Jensen hunches a little more over it instinctively, then consciously relaxes and lets Jared see. It’s a hardback version of _The Hunchback of Notre Dame_ , again not one which Jared has read, but he knows the basic story and can’t see anything wrong with it. With a soothing pat to the back of Jensen’s neck, he goes to kiss Gen good morning properly. 

 

“Thought you might like to sleep in a bit,” she says, returning the kiss with interest, referring obliquely to the shitty day they’d both had yesterday. Jared liked to sleep in after days like that, Gen liked to bury herself in work to try and forget. From the darkness under her eyes, he wasn’t sure how successful that had been, but decided not to press the point, just brought up his own work to start on. If he got enough done in the morning, he’d take the afternoon off and he already had plans for that time. 

 

The first thing that popped up though was the contract that Gen had slid from her palm point to his at some point, and hesitant he looked at Jensen and Gen. Seeing that they were pretty absorbed in their respective occupations, he headed for the front room ostensibly to write in privacy; in reality to read the contract. He wasn’t sure why he was doing this- it was bringing nothing good to their lives, he knew that much, but curiosity really was his besetting sin, and for once he was giving into it.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to tipsy_kitty for the edit!

The thing about contracts, Jared very quickly discovered, is that they're near impossible to understand if you're just skimming through. He didn't have a clue about most of the legalese used in them, and couldn't help thinking that lawyers had devised some impenetrable language precisely to keep themselves in jobs. Some bits of it seemed to make sense if he squinted but then with three additional clauses they stopped making sense almost entirely. He tried to take it a paragraph at a time, but kept getting bogged down in the details of what was being said when he just wanted the bigger picture. All he could tell for certain after dipping in and out was that in a very real way they'd _rented_ Jensen rather than bought him. When his contract was terminated, his remains would be retained by the Farm, though of course Jared and Gen between them would have full control and ownership of any issue produced by Jensen, a phrase that sent a surge of uneasiness through Jared. It's a baby, he thought, you can't _own_ a baby. He was so absorbed in reading his way through the codicils at the end that he didn't notice the cup of coffee appearing to his right, and when he finally looked up and saw it, it had long gone cold. He made a face at it and made his way into the kitchen to make another one. 

 

When he was done with that he wandered into the study to see how Gen and Jensen were doing respectively and with careless ease insinuated himself into the group and tried not to think about the contract. He shoved the contract and all of the uneasiness he felt to one side, sure that he was overreacting, that so much time spent making shit up for the vids was warping his ability to tell what was normal and what was odd. He didn't completely stop thinking about it; sometimes at night as Gen lay tucked into the curve of his arm, and Jensen was a heavy weight on his legs, he let his mind wander back to the contract, but there was nothing he could do to change it anyway, so he let it go for now. 

 

Jared could pinpoint exactly the day, even the moment, when it all went wrong. He and Gen had slept late, and Jensen had been up long before them, making breakfast and then disappearing somewhere. Jared hadn't thought anything of it, and had launched straight into work. It wasn’t until hours later that he surfaced to get a cup of coffee.

 

Gen, buried deep in her work, barely glanced up, and Jensen had disappeared somewhere. Remembering what had happened last time Jensen had vanished like this, Jared set off to search for him again. They were just starting to find some sense of equilibrium again after first the disturbance and then the clinic visit; he didn't want a repeat of whatever had caused Jensen to break down last time. He needn't have worried about another bout of crying though, Jensen was in his own room, stretched out on the bed, hands pillowed under his head as he stared up at the ceiling. His face was blank and slack as though he were thinking very, very hard about something, and Jared took advantage of the opportunity to lean down and kiss him hard enough to wipe that look off his face.

 

Jensen responded as enthusiastically as usual, and his hands went straight to Jared's zipper in a motion that felt so practiced that Jared's libido wilted noticeably, though he couldn’t have said why. 

 

"We don't have to fuck every time I kiss you, you know," Jared said, and looked at Jensen for a response. Jensen's eyes were politely inquiring as though he didn't quite believe that, but he didn't push the point- that wasn't what he did. Instead he took his hands away from Jared's crotch as easily as he'd put them there, eyes flicking back to the ceiling as though there was something terribly fascinating there. Jared wondered for a second if this was what Jensen looked like on down-time and hell, he hadn't thought his dick could get any less interested. He stood back up unsure of what he felt or why, just knowing that right now there was nothing that Jensen could do right, and that it was his fault, not Jensen's.

 

Jensen wasn't moving and when Jared stroked his arm affectionately, briefly, he moved it away like he didn't even want to be touched. It took a while for Jared to process exactly what he was feeling, but mostly it was shock- Jensen had never done this before- intermixed with concern for Jensen, and underneath it all an unpleasant sensation of indignation. He was not sure why he was as horrified as he was at that. Surely he had a perfect right to be annoyed, even to be angry? This was not part of the contract, this was not what they'd signed up for. A little bit of him was thinking that Jensen didn't get to be standoffish and cold. He took his hand away anyway, sickened a little by himself. Surely he had some self control?

 

Jensen flicked his eyes back to him. "Can I do anything for you?" he asked, and began sitting up with intent as though it didn't matter what he did, just that he did something, and Jared felt a twist of irritation run through him as he pressed Jensen back down- it was harder than he'd expected, Jared was bigger but Jensen was deceptively, surprisingly strong, and he didn't go back down until he'd untensed himself and sank back. He was looking at Jared properly now, and he didn't look like Jensen- his eyes were narrowed as though he were looking past Jared's skin, past his face into his mind, and Jared felt the strangest urge to cover himself as though that could possibly help. "Well, if I can't do anything for you," Jensen said, and Jared wasn't sure if there was the slightest, tiniest hint of exasperation in that tone, and that twist of irritation grew stronger, squirmed its way through him until it was practically all he felt. Damn Jensen, always so reasonable, so inhuman, so ready and willing to oblige when that wasn't what Jared wanted at all. Not that he could articulate precisely what he wanted from Jensen, who wasn't Gen and wasn't equipped to provide him with the same sort of things. 

 

Something hard poked him in the thigh as he shifted, and when he fumbled his hand under the cover he withdrew the book that he'd meant to throw away. The one he'd found under Jensen's bed- _If This Is A Man_ \- the time he'd found Jensen crying in the garden, the one and only time Jensen had slipped up so completely, shown anything beyond the standard pre-programmed love he came equipped with. He looked up with a question on his lips- why had Jensen kept it with him when it had upset him so much? and wasn't prepared for the flash of panic that had swept Jensen's eyes, and like a monkey's paw, the wish he'd expressed so silently a few minutes before was being granted in precisely the way he didn't want. He wanted a Jensen who was less Jensen-like and more at the same time, and here he was being granted that but with an extra bonus of fear.

 

When he looked up Gen was standing by the door, and Jared looked at her, raising his eyebrows. She nodded him out, and explained in a whisper that Jensen thought he might be having a bit of a delayed reaction to the shots- apparently they could cause nausea as the body adjusted, and Jared accepted it, felt guilty for pressing. "Should we phone the clinic?" he asked, and she thought about it.

 

"No," she decided in the end, "that should be a last resort I think. Jensen said he should feel better by the evening. He's almost over it he thinks.” Jared accepted that though something didn't quite ring true to him about the whole thing. Jensen had never been ill a day in his life, and he hadn’t looked ill, just tired and worn out.

 

Try as he might, he couldn't put a finger on it though, had to give up though it niggled away in the back of his mind, relentlessly tapping his brain as though he was missing the obvious. Jensen was better by the evening though- crisis over, bright big smile back on his face and sincere apologies spilling out all over. He sat with them as usual, watched them eat their food, quietly got drinks and cleared the plates, and always, always there was an abstracted quality to him, like he was a million miles away. In deference to his queasy stomach, they didn't have sex that night. Jensen lay there with them still and warm and heavy, breathing quietly and evenly as always, until Jared didn't know how he knew the other man wasn't asleep.

 

A day later it was like nothing had happened. Jensen was smiling and as talkative as he ever was again, trundling round the house fixing up odds and ends where he found them. When he'd done everything he could he lapsed back into general usefulness until Jared had a great idea. This house was older than the average and although they'd had the general computer system built into the house there were still failures and flaws that most places wouldn't have- which most of their friends couldn't believe they managed to live with- failing air conditioning, periodic fluctuations in signal all of which added to the charm for Jared and Gen. It'd belonged to his parents before him, and Jared had never changed much about it- his mother had had excellent taste so they’d left a lot of things as they’d been when they’d moved in. That included his mother’s workroom.

 

Jared had thought he was getting the hang of what Jensen was, but it was still with surprise that he realised just how interested Jensen was in the mains powered laser metal cutters, bangle machine and assorted other wood turning machinery that his mother had used for creating jewelry and art pieces. As a kid, he'd watched fascinated for hours as she'd shaped little twists of metal into jewelry, and embedded semi-precious gems into them before selling them as one-off originals. It had been an expensive pursuit and not something Jared had ever been interested in doing himself. By the time his parents had chosen to move closer to the city and leave the house to Jared, his mom had made the transition to the fine line lasers that were much more wieldy and had a great deal more safety catches than the old fashioned machinery.

 

He hadn't even been into the garage subsection that held those tools for what felt like years, but after he discussed it with Gen she'd thought it was a brilliant idea. "Fantastic," she said with genuine enthusiasm. "He really seems to like making and fixing things so that's a great idea. Do we need any stuff?" 

 

"Nope," Jared said, "the machines are in great working order, and there are bits and pieces of scrap left over. If he enjoys it then we can buy him some more, I bet my mom still has contacts." He patted the woodturning machine. "I can't believe how old this stuff is," he said with a smile, and called Jensen in. Jared had been absolutely right- Jensen's face lit up at the sight- things to fix and then things to make, and he slipped away to spend most of his time in there. The only bad thing was, that the machines were power drains which put pressure on the main core and resulted in occasional blowouts of light and heat. The first time it happened Jensen had come as close as he could to a refusal to continue, citing that he was putting them at risk. Gen had settled that one with a kiss and a request for a bracelet which Jensen had laughingly acquiesced to. 

 

He spent most of his time on the bracelet at first, beginning with neat, lifeless drawings, unskilled and untutored, and his first attempts were disasters- square and clunky, the easiest shapes to both draw and create. As time went by and he learned to handle the machines better though (and to offer his sketches for consideration) he learnt to turn out nice little pieces. Jared wasn’t exactly an expert on jewelry but he could see the difference between Jensen's careful little designs, and his mother's careless ease with her tools and her vision, and unbidden he remembered once again only an Omega like a defensive little nudge popping up whenever he thought about Jensen too much.

 

Jared took to popping in to check on Jensen from time to time, once or twice bringing him his silver sealed bags of food so he could break without disrupting his concentration. He couldn't ever remember being quite this happy or this productive; he'd finished all three of his contracts and only had to wait for the credit to come in now. Gen was flying as well within her own sphere- the world was so much smaller now, so many fewer people than the past that it was harder to make a splash but everything was on the move upwards, and Jared was basking a little bit, which really was his first mistake.

 

This particular afternoon was no different- Gen was in the study, conferencing in with the VP, Jensen was practicing his fine motor skills in the garage and Jared was taking it easy, when he noticed the light flickering. Clearly the power drain from the machines was taking its toll, and he popped along to tell Jensen to ease off on the usage, only to find the machine off, and a flushed and sweaty Jensen crawling out of a hole in the wall. "What are you doing?" Jared asked, offering a hand which Jensen used to pull himself upright. 

 

"I've fiddled with the mainframe before," Jensen said ruefully, "I thought I could make it more efficient, stop the power draining so quickly," he nodded to the floor where an ancient manual was spread open, "but there was nothing I could do. I'm really sorry if it disrupted anything.

 

Jared shrugged it off. "Nothing important," he said, "just me being lazy," and Jensen gave a laugh at that, his eyes still sliding away from Jared as though to focus on something else, his face still fading red, and though he didn't say anything to Jensen, he voiced it to Gen later that night, when he was sure they were alone. 

 

"Do you think Jensen could be ready?" he asked, and bit his lip as the words fell like bricks. "He seemed really weird earlier, all hot and flushed and like he'd been sick, and, well, it has been several months since the checkup.”

 

"Is that even possible?" Gen asked and if he hadn't known her so well even Jared might have missed the hunted look that flashed across her face. "You’re not supposed to be able to tell someone is pregnant until later. Besides, he takes a pregnancy test every week just in case, and he hasn’t even begun the regime at the clinic." There was something even he couldn’t read in her voice. "If he's pregnant then we’re going to have to back there and work on that DNA manipulation they were talking about."

 

Jared cuddled her closer against him. "None of that matters," he said and kissed the top of her head, "I mean we don’t even know if he is yet," and although neither of them had wanted it to happen this way or this soon, he felt a curl of excitement trickle through him at the thought. A few months from now, they might have their baby. And Jensen…. Jensen would be gone. Even in the privacy of his own mind he couldn't think more harshly than that. The platitudes the clinic had offered them skittered across his thoughts, gone, terminated, finished. Done with, and even in the depths of his happiness he felt a coldness. All the temporary joy had fled Gen as well now, and she was holding onto him less in a hug and more a grip of iron like she couldn't let him go. 

 

"Don't say it," he said quietly, "please don't say it Gen. We're not even sure yet after all. I'm just going off Jensen not looking in top shape. He might just be ill or something." Even as he said it though, he was sure that he was wrong, a flash of intuition hitting him hard. This was happening. Jensen was pregnant. 

 

There was a whole box of pregnancy tests; Jensen took one every week just in case. If he was confirmed pregnant then they could look into gene transference, making sure some of Gen's genetic traits got into the mix. Just a standard blood test and then they’d know. Jared had never inquired too closely into the exact mechanics of an Omega's body- that came far too close to the faintly taboo sounding 'medicine,' but he knew enough that a blood test would be preferable. All Omegas, male and female, ended up on the operating table so he wasn't even sure how the functions matched up.

 

Anyway, that wasn't what they were doing at least not at this moment. They sat with Jensen in absolute silence, waiting for the slow beep that would indicate whether he was expecting the baby or not, Gen curled up next to Jensen, Jared watching them both, not even sure any more which result he wanted the most. It took only a few seconds for the blood analysis to be completed and for the sound to inform them all that Jensen was pregnant. 

 

Jensen's face was blank and unreadable, nothing of the joy that Jared had expected from everything the Clinic had said- that Omegas wanted their children, wanted nothing more than to have that child for their owners. Jared didn't know how to react, not when he wasn't even certain that he was happy himself, and in the end when Jensen dashed to the toilet to throw up, Jared didn't follow him. Instead he and Gen sat staring at each other, at a loss for words, as they listened to Jensen's footsteps recede. 

 

When Jensen came back, he was calm, still not smiling, though he managed a weak twitch of the lips. "I'm really sorry," he said, "it was just a shock, I have no idea why that happened." He sat back down like they hadn't just discovered the best news to be expected, at least from Jensen's viewpoint. "I'm so excited about the baby," he said, and resurrected the same weak smile that he'd given them a few minutes before, eminently unconvincing though nobody felt up to challenging it at that moment in time. 

 

Jared stared at his hands and let silence fall once again in the room, everything he could think to say, dying in his mouth, tasting of lies and defeat.

 

"I should sleep in the other room tonight," Jensen said quietly, though he didn't say 'my room'. "I wouldn't want to be sick on you after all," and though he tried to pass it off as a joke it didn't sound like it. Jared and Gen agreed automatically, and he shuffled off, leaving them to lie next to each other in a bed that seemed too empty.

s  
Jared stared at the ceiling in the dark, and tried not to think of anything, until Gen whispered something into his neck. "Jared," she said softly and he didn't reply, pretended that he was asleep. Some things he didn't want to hear. She tucked her mouth up to his ear, and said what he'd been dreading. "I think he knows." No need to ask who or what. The idea was ridiculous of course, there was no way that Jensen could know, and yet Jared couldn't quite convince himself of that. What other reason could there be for Jensen to be so distraught over the news? As much as he tried to argue against it, it was the obvious solution.

 

"Gen," he said and he was not even sure what was in his own voice- entreaty maybe. There was no denial though, because in that second everything was clear, every single thing snapped back into place, everything made sense. Piece by piece it fell into position. "That night he was ill," Jared said, thinking out loud, words not keeping up with his brain but doing the best they could. "He wasn't sick." 

 

"He just didn't want to look at us." Gen was up, off him immediately, wrenching open the bathroom, being sick like those words had had a direct line to her stomach. Because it was right there in front of them. All of the justifications that they'd placated themselves with for so long, none of them were worth shit when held up against the reality of Jensen knowing. They'd been free to have their doubts, been free to feel distressed at the impending death of some _one_ not just _something_ that they'd realized was worth more than a pet, but they hadn't done a single thing about it because it wasn't real. Wasn't present in their thoughts that this was a game with a zero sum outcome for Jensen. But the thought of Jensen knowing of his own death, his preplanned death that was not possible to avert, brought reality home to them. Jared's legs felt weak, too weak to walk on, and there was a bottomless pit inside of him, falling in on itself and he thought detachedly that he might be close to fainting.

 

Then Gen was crawling back on the bed, wet and disheveled, hair sticking to her face. "Jared," she repeated and he realized she'd said it more than once. "Jared, we have to do something."

 

"There's nothing we can do," he said numbly, "we signed his death warrant the first time we had sex with him." But it's not the sex he's thinking of. It's the semen. Crawling inside Jensen, knocking him up, fucking up his cells until they're beyond repair, until he dies. "We can't do anything Gen," and he'd never felt so helpless at any point in his life. They could take Jensen away, but where? Europe had been a no-go zone for fifty, sixty years now, the border controls too stringent to ever hope to fool. Even the package tours there that had been operative when Jared was a kid no longer ran, a state almost of cold war existing between them; no trade, nothing, not since they’d closed their doors. 

 

The Federated States of Africa were a better bet, since the US still had trade links open with them, and judging from the restrained reports that still got a tiny bit of news coverage it seemed to be the place where the wheels were moving in terms of innovative medicine. Getting a passport and a visa there would be gold dust though.

 

But the more he turned over the options in his mind the more futile it all seemed. The timebomb wasn't where they lived, it wasn't the clinic visit that loomed inevitably in their future. It was in Jensen's blood, inevitable and horrific, flooding through his veins, a death sentence writ large. Wherever they went, the sharp ugly truth followed them, that in a little under nine months Jensen would be dead, possibly even less if something went wrong. There was nothing they could do to stop it, to change the path which lay clear and straight before them. 

 

The helplessness was more than he could take and he buried his head in his hands, unable even to take comfort in Gen being close when he saw how agonized she was as well. "There must be something," she said numbly. "There must be something that can stop this from going ahead," but the words were thin and hopeless, as empty and futile as anything else that they could say. Jared considered waking Jensen up, telling him that they knew he knew, but recoiled from the idea with an almost physical repulsion at the thought. 

 

"No," he said quietly, but it wasn't the no of denial. It was the instinctive response of not wanting it to be true. "Gen," he said, "we fucked up." His eyes felt too dry and hot to cry. 

 

There was nothing else to do but to lie there and stare blankly into the darkness, the soft hum of everyday life around them a soothing familiar lullaby that Jensen had no part or place in, not anymore. Jared tried to think about what had happened, but his mind skittered away from it, as though it was too big to take in, too impossible to think of, too painful to grasp hold of. Every time he thought he had a grip on it, their callousness rose up to choke him, and even now part of him was desperately fighting back against the thought, desperately trying to reassert everything that they'd been told.

 

Omegas weren't human, the cold bit of his mind reminded him. Why else would they be bought and sold like stock market options? If they were human this would never have happened. It was impossible to think that it could have and therefore it couldn’t have. They were conveniences and Gen and he were overreacting, being dramatic over something the rest of the world thought was entirely natural. Yet against all those reasonable points, he had only one solid thing to stand against them. The heaving sickness inside him at the thought of Jensen knowing. The absolute bleak certainty that they had done something wrong, that didn't come from his brain or even his heart, but straight from his gut. The roiling protest inside him at the thought of Jensen, Jensen who could read and understand, make jewelry, laugh, fuck them both with perfect impunity, mend the flickering light system without a murmur and feel sorrow for people who'd been dead for centuries; the Jensen they'd come to know, learning that he'd been bought not for love, not for family, but as a disposable object to be used and thrown, a chrysalis and not a butterfly. That he would die, and as far as he knew, they'd never mourn him. Never remember him.


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took so long but on the bright side, almost finished! Thanks once again to Tipsy_kitty for her assistance, any mistakes that remain are my own.

The rest of the night was one that Jared would never forget, no matter how long he lived. Most of it was dreamlike, not quite real as though he couldn't connect to it, but he remembered enough of it to torture him- rolling over to realize Gen's eyes were so sore and red from crying that she could barely blink anymore, the space stretching between them like neither of them could ask for comfort, neither of them able to accept anything, not for now. The sun rose and cast stark rays into the room and still neither of them moved, even though Jared had thought things couldn't possibly be worse in the morning. That wasn't something that was accurate though- the moment he sat up, he caught sight of himself in the mirror, so creased and worn it was like ten years had passed by in the night. Gen was on her side, curled up amongst the duvet and sheets, her fingers pressing so tightly into the cotton, he could see the strain in her hands from where he was standing. "I'm going to shower," he said abruptly, held out his hand, because whether they deserved comfort or not, he wasn't going to let this take everything from him. For a moment it looked like Gen was going to ignore him, but then she reached out her fingers and wound them around his tentatively, as though there was something wrong in easing themselves even a little.

 

Pressed up close to her in the shower, Jared let himself go again, lost in the water, clutching futilely at Gen, desperate for the comfort and obscurely comforted by the closeness, like two wrongs made a right when pressed together. The water couldn't wash away the events of the night but the slow beat of it off his face cleared his head a little, drove the worst of the nightmares from him, let him think that there must be something they could do. Something. Jared's strength had always been solution-finding, and Gen's had always been carrying out their joint projects. Together they would crack this.

 

When they finally made it downstairs, the first thing they noticed was the lack of coffee. Usually by this time Jensen would be up, making it briskly, getting the day set up and on the road. But there on the side was still the carafe from last night, left out, not washed or put in the cupboard, and the window was still blinded and shuttered against the glare of the sun. There was a silence, a blankness that suffused the entire place, that more than anything else let Jared know that something was wrong. The deadness of the air, the quietness of the network, everything about it, said that something had happened to Jensen. The same thought had occurred to Gen; she dashed up the stairs to Jensen's room, and as Jared had known, she found it empty. Methodically they searched the house, leaving until last, as though by some awful instinct, the garage.

 

When they went in, Jared's first sick thought was one of relief. There was no body- he hadn't realized until that second that he had expected Jensen to take the obvious way out- one of revenge and hate and sheer brutal necessity. What was there though was little better. On the side, near one of the stupid fucking machines Jared had thought was such a fantastic idea (make that last year of Jensen's life better!) was the collar, neatly cut through and left behind, the small tracking chip blinking uselessly at him. When they ran outside the house in bare feet, the car was gone as well, and Jared swore uselessly at the distance. Jensen had taken it and gone, and most of Jared was filled with sickly pulsing fear because of everything that Jensen didn't know. He wouldn't make it more than a few miles. Not when the car could be overridden from the house and ground to a halt, not when even if somehow that didn't work, Jensen knew nothing about surviving in the outside world. A few months ago, he'd never even been outside the facility. Never seen so much as a fertiliplant field.

 

Jared went straight to the central controls and punched in the numbers to access the car and bring it back home. A discreet denied sign flashed up, and with a deepening frown he pressed them in again and was greeted with the same message. Accessing the second layer of authentication he pressed his eye to the scanner and the system let him in as it was encoded to do. Even then, it politely refused to allow him to change the destination of the car, and Jared had to turn away in frustration. "He's done something," he told Gen, "we can't bring the car back." With an unwanted flicker of memory he saw Jensen in his mind’s eye, always deep in manuals, half in, half out of the wall, explaining, fixing, learning things, all of the time, all the times the power had shut off accidentally, and Jared had never even thought that he would do something like this -  _could_ do something like this.

 

When he ordered the computer to do a check, the answer was depressing and inevitable. Half of it had been overloaded, and the other half was on lockdown, and there was nothing they could do about it. Jared couldn't even quantify what he was feeling- anger was predominant, anger and fear because the only hope had been that they would be able to find Jensen first. If he got picked up by a cop or by the resident authority, they wouldn't return him to Jared and Gen, they'd send him straight to the farm. Jensen had disabled everything, even his palm device wasn't connecting; there was no way to get a call through, but there was nothing Jensen could’ve done about the car's inbuilt tracker. They watched helplessly as he headed towards the nearest city, over three hundred miles away.

 

The thing was, Jensen couldn't survive out there, even without his unwanted house guest. He didn't  _know_ anything, he'd never been anywhere. Only a few months before he was overcome at the sight of fields- a city was going to be more than he could comprehend. Jared and Gen's personal network might be badly secured but there was no way Jensen could access their far more heavily protected funds, and with no money, probably no clothes and not a clue how to survive, he'd be caught in minutes.

 

"It's not like it was," Gen said tensely and one of the perks of marriage is that he knew exactly what she meant. Jensen's only experience with the real world had been through books that were sometimes centuries out of date. Jared kind of doubted that in the limited time he'd had with the web, Jensen's first priority was seeing what had changed about the world, and more learning what he could, as fast as he could. He probably thought there were places where he could lose himself, where no one would ever find him, when the only places like that these days were also the places that would know what he was at a glance, would take him for everything that he had. And if they found out what he was, they would tear him apart for a baby that would be worth so much to a couple who had been turned down by any clinic. He was in more danger than ever.

 

“I know,” he said. “God Gen we have to think of something.” He was racking his own brains for a solution - how to get Jensen back without alerting anyone to the fact he’d gone missing in the first place - but nothing was springing to mind. It took staring at the contract, still up and minimized in a corner of his screen, for an idea to germinate. “Gen,” he said slowly. “Adrianne.”

 

“Of course,” Gen said and scooted closer. She lived in the city Jensen was heading for. If she could intercept him, she could  _explain_ why he needed to come back. “But Jared, Adrianne’s going to ask questions as well. Like why we need her to go and pick up an Omega without a collar and why we’re not doing it ourselves.”

 

“We’re just going to have to hope that she’s intrigued enough to hear the full story,” Jared said. He remembered that he’d asked Adrianne to look through Jensen’s contract for loopholes, and his stomach gave an uncomfortable lurch. Adrianne was smart as a whip, and it surely would be all too easy to piece together what had happened. They had to take the risk though.

 

Gen connected through and waited for Adrianne to pick up, fingers tapping against her earpiece, a worried jittery rhythm. “Hey Adrianne,” she said, and Jared could tell the effort it was taking to keep her voice light and breezy, when every bone of her body was rigid. Gen had keyed the call to the speakers so Jared could hear both sides of the conversation, and Adrianne’s reply sounded intrigued.

 

“Hey Gen. What do you need?”

 

This was the crux point. There were other people they could call, but nobody they were as close to as Adrianne. “Well, this really stupid chain of events happened. Jensen, you know Jensen, our Omega, he got this idea in his head that I really wanted something from the city. And well, you know what Omegas are like, always want to please. He didn’t know what a city was even, and we think he just got in the car and voice activated the controls to take himself there. Something’s gone wrong with the network though and we can’t bring the car back or get through to him,” as the lie went on, Gen became more confident, her grip on the chair relaxing a bit. “...so,” she concluded, “if you could grab him when he comes into the city, we’d appreciate it more than we could possibly say. We don’t want a lot of fuss and nonsense with police when really it’s just a huge misunderstanding.”

 

Adrianne had remained silent through the spiel, but her voice cut in now. “Gen,” she said, “I don’t need a video screen to tell when you’re lying you know. I’m a lawyer, we’re good at spotting things like that. And you always babble when you’re nervous. What’s actually going on?”

 

“We can’t tell you,” Gen said, and if Adrianne could detect lies, Jared thought, she must be able to pick up on the misery and exhaustion that came through now that Gen was no longer pretending to be cheerful. “I mean, we will, I promise. But we can’t yet. Please believe us. It’s nothing illegal, it’s just complicated.”

 

There was silence on the other end of the line for a long moment as though, like Jared had feared, Adrianne was putting all sorts of thoughts together – two plus two and maybe, terrifyingly, coming up with four. Then finally, “I will, but some day, when you can give them, I’m going to want answers you know.” It was a fair trade to make all things considered.

 

Now that was sorted, the rest would be simple hopefully. Jared informed Adrianne of the route that Jensen was taking and she agreed to take out her own car and intercept him along the way before he reached the city. She keyed her own earpiece to constant relay so she could keep them updated, and they could tell her if Jensen made any sudden changes in direction. He was about 50 miles from the outskirts of the city, and Adrianne was about 20 miles from him, when the tracker suddenly stopped moving, as though Jensen had decided to go the rest of the way on foot for some reason - or as though he’d been stopped.

 

Only minutes later, Adrianne confirmed that Jensen had been stopped and presumably taken into custody since he didn’t have an ID bracelet. What happened next caused Jared to thank any deity that existed that they’d chosen Adrianne to try and find him. Before they’d even booked Jensen, examined him or asked him any questions that could’ve revealed what Jensen was, Adrianne was there, every inch the angry lawyer defending her client and haranguing the police for taking ‘Jared’ into custody just because his ID bracelet was being renewed. To the only person who seemed astute enough to ask how she’d found them so fast, she’d loftily told them that ‘Jared’ had been meant to be meeting her for lunch. On the other side of the earpiece, Jared and Gen listened as she insinuated incompetency with cool ease, hinted at lawsuits for a waste of her and her client’s time, and hustled Jensen out of the door in what had to be a record time before they even had the chance to begin to think that ‘Jared’ might not be who he appeared to be. Since he hadn’t been booked there was no trace left.

 

Adrianne had offered to bring him home to them but Jensen had voluntarily locked in his destination in the car, and then disabled his access, a mute gesture of hopelessness, Jared thought as Adrianne described it. Seven hours later, Adrianne was back at work secured in a promise that when this was over, they’d tell her everything, and Jensen was back at the house, worn and tired, in Jared’s old clothes, and standing in front of them like he didn’t have the will to say or do anything.

 

Now that Jared looked closer, knowing what he was looking for and  ignoring the looseness of the clothes Jensen usually wore, he could see the traces of Jensen's lies all over his body. He wasn't a few days along, perhaps not even a month or two, since there was, now that Jared  was looking for it, a slight thickening of the waist. Nothing that he and Gen would have noticed probably, but close enough that soon they would have had to. He can’t remember all the details of all the sex they had had but he wondered if Jensen’s fondness of giving head had stemmed from that point. Now he understood how imperative it had been to Jensen to make his break at that point, before he and Gen realized all this. It also meant given the weekly testing that Jensen underwent that he'd known about this for longer than he’d let on, and Jared couldn't imagine what having that knowledge would have felt like, knowing that you were carrying your own death around with you and still you had to pretend like everything was normal and natural. In the end, he and Gen had trusted too much. Trusted in the promises of the clinic that Omegas couldn't,  _wouldn't_  lie, that Jensen liked his life with them, and they hadn't let any evidence to the contrary dissuade them.

 

Jensen didn't follow them up to bed, and although Jared felt like a heel, that still hurt a bit. Omegas  _wanted_  sex all the time, craved it even; they hadn't done anything wrong by taking advantage of that. He remembered every time Jensen had woken him up with a blowjob, or gone down on Gen so many times that she could barely moan, rubbing himself against the bedspread until he came just from that. Could he have faked that sort of enthusiasm, the gleefulness of the sex they'd had? He remembers Jensen's fingers fumbling at his belt the day everything went wrong and he didn't know what to think anymore, didn't want to put a name to the growing, sickening thoughts that were blossoming inside him. How much of the man (funny how he still stumbled over that nominative even in his head, even now after everything) before them had ever been the real Jensen? He wants to know but he's too scared of the answer to ask. Too scared of the sort of words, the names that could be attached to what they’ve done to Jensen, even unknowingly.

 

The next day when they were at least a little refreshed from a night’s sleep, they gathered in the front room. Jensen was sitting hunched, his arms not crossed over his stomach, nothing protective about his posture, nothing of the Farm's promise of how much Omegas loved their children or had to be torn away from them sometimes. Of course, that was when they believed they were adding to a loved family, he guessed, and tore his eyes away from the now apparent slight curve of Jensen's stomach. Despite everything, he couldn't help a throb of sheer want in the pit of his gut, an almost painful urge to have their child in his arms, and he wondered if that would go on the list of his crimes, that after all this he could still think of how much he wanted their baby .

 

Gen came in, fingers clutched tight around her palm-piece, and sat cross-legged beside Jared, warm and comforting at his side. "There's nothing much out there," she said abruptly, something they all knew. "Just some stuff about how natural births are better."

 

"Natural births?" Jared asked.

 

"Without painkillers," she murmured, and the topic died on its feet. There was no way out of this for them; Jared had tried and tried to think of a solution but every one of them died on its feet. Jensen couldn't leave, there was no point in that; he'd either be rounded straight up and taken to the Farm or he'd just die alone in a few months, and his baby along with him. Maybe if they could get him out of the US, but the question then arose  _where_. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to flee to, no hope at all, just sheer pointless bleakness stretching out ahead of them, more helpless than anything Jared could ever have imagined.

 

Gen's still tapping away at the palm-point she's holding, skimming her way through page after page of useless information. The net isn't exactly that useful and there's nothing turning up but the same bland baby tips, the same platitudes, the specially designed memorial stones for your garden that you can buy once your Omega had 'finished their employment.' It's hard to believe there's anyone out there who has ever felt the same way as them, but Jared knows Gen can't imagine that they're the first. She's looking for answers and hoping that they're out there. "How did you know?" she asked at last and someone who didn't know her as well as Jared would have thought the words cold and blunt. Jared caught every nuance behind them though, pressed her fingers in his for having the bravery to ask what he didn't dare.

 

Jensen wasn't interested in withholding the truth it seemed, not anymore, more hopeless now than he'd been on the night they'd found out that he was expecting, more hopeless than when they'd dragged him back to the house and he'd known for certain he couldn't escape. "It was the books," he began, and of course it was. What else could it have been? "You bought these books from some antiquer’s place," and Jared knew which ones he meant, the deadweight of them, nothing even Gen was interested in reading, old, pre-chemical war books, with pages that had been cleansed before being sold on. "There was a brochure in one of them folded up between the pages." He left for a second. When he returned he was carrying the same book as usual, but this time he removes the thin flexible sheet from it. The pictures are bright but tasteful, the text small and easy to size up. There were perhaps four models- it's one of the expensive mini farms, and there's a price listed beside each one that's pretty boggling.

 

"I couldn't understand what they were doing," Jensen said and there was a crack in his voice. "I mean I didn't even understand they were being sold, it's not like that's what they say right there on the brochure. But they were dressed the same as me and they looked the same” - there was a glassy perfection to each of the models on the sheet - “and the thought wouldn't leave me alone. So I read and read, and gradually I realized that those things you said in the past, about slavery, torture, people in camps - the things you told me were fiction and if not fiction then past? They're as real as anything else, not a lie at all. Not past either."

 

It took me a long time to figure it all out. But if there was one thing I thought I had it was time. It was pretty easy to find out what I was. What I was grown-n for." The stutter was barely noticeable but it was there. "That wasn't the hard part. The hard bit was finding out why. There's nothing out there.  _Nothing._  It's all polite words for death and babies,” and still his hand didn't touch his stomach, no protectiveness in his posture or glance downwards, but Jared couldn't help flicking his own eyes down. "I pieced it together. Figured it out and had to start planning how to get out. First to get rid of the collar." The rest of it came out in a rush of words, garbled and messy as his plan had been. Getting clothes Jared didn't use anymore from his wardrobe, secreting them away, teaching himself as much as he could in the earliest of mornings and the latest of nights. The old broken palm-point without a password that he'd used for access, how he'd watched them type in the password for the main computer. Everything.

 

Gen and Jared sat in stunned silence, unsure of what to say. Jensen's plan had been messy in the extreme, so rough around the edges there had been no chance it could work – the sort of plan only someone desperate would think could work, but the hope behind it had kept him going. That he'd figure out how to get away before they decided it was time for children. When he’d realized that it was too late, when they’d found out, he’d tried to run anyway, for the hell of it. When he finally ran out of words, he just gazed at them numbly as though he couldn't care anymore. There was nothing now of the smile he always had lurking around the corner of his mouth, he looked older even. "I know what's going to happen," he said, quietly. "You're going to keep me here and then take me into the clinic at the end and you'll watch me die. I hope you remember it for the rest of your lives, I hope you remember what you did to me."

 

There was nothing that could be said and he stood up, left the room with a quiet tread, headed to the bedroom that had been so little used, there being a tacit understanding now that nothing could be what it had been. Jared would never know how he got up the courage to ask what he did before Jensen was out of sight. "Did you always hate us this much?" and his palms were damp with fear for the answer. He saw the hesitation before Jensen replied as though he was weighing his words, deciding whether to hurt them some more, cut them deep enough that they'd feel his pain.

 

"When I first came here, I didn't hate you," he said softly. "I didn't know any better. Then I did and I despised you. Now, I just pity you," and finally his hand slipped down to his stomach. "Is it worth it?" he asked, and the question wasn't rhetorical but neither Gen nor Jared had an answer for him. Then he was gone, melting into the darkness beyond the door, leaving them behind.

 

The next few months were hellish for all concerned. Jared didn't realize until Jensen stopped participating just how much of a part of their life he'd been, how integral he'd become to the household. He still helped out around the place, still performed the duties he'd set himself as though even now he had a sense of duty that could not to be overridden.

 

The big difference was that he never touched them, not even accidentally, not a brush of hands as he handed over the coffee or a nudge to the shoulder. Every action was impeccably correct and meaningless, and Jared couldn't even imagine how to begin to bridge that gap or even if he should. Their bed felt bigger and emptier now that Jensen never went into their room, and they both spent their time in oscillating ricocheting emotions. They had each other still but somewhere along the way Jensen had become part of their life together. It was just a precursor, Jared knew, to the longer, final separation that loomed before them. When pressed, Jensen had admitted that he was at least two and a half months along when he'd left, and now at almost six months there was no way he could pass for not being pregnant. It was already way past time for any of his checkups to have taken place but that's the one thing Jensen's asked of them, the one thing that they could give him - that he didn't have to go back there before his final visit, the one where he wouldn’t come back out again. It was little enough to ask for after everything that has happened, and they agreed despite the trouble it would cause. Sometimes Jared caught himself worrying over whether Jensen needed something else to keep him healthy, but Jensen didn't seem adversely affected by the changes happening, and he had got a large enough frame that sometimes Jared couldn't even see the bump when he was looking straight on.

 

Sometimes he caught Gen staring at Jensen as well, and he knew that she was thinking what he was thinking, that same sickening mixture of guilt and horror intertwined with the knowledge that despite everything there was a child coming to them. He couldn't even parse all the different emotions that came with that, except that he was excited, and that sometimes he wondered that if Jensen had never found out would they still have missed him. Watching Jensen, he knew the answer was yes but that didn’t make anything better.

 

The bracelet Jensen had redesigned over and over for Gen was left neglected and half finished, the setting for the small amethysts bent out of shape still, laid to one side but carefully as though there was something there still, and Jared felt stupid for taking any hope from it, but hope is never logical. Jensen still spent a little bit of time in the garage with the machines but Jared didn't drop by for chats anymore. If Jensen wanted to say anything to them that wasn’t good morning or ‘would you like a refill’ then that had to be his choice. They'd taken enough choices from him already, and even if he couldn't quite make himself understand that it was all over, it was.

 

Jensen's about seven months along when it went wrong, when he doubled over, retching and desperate. Without a second's thought Gen was at his side, hands on him for maybe the first time since they found out everything, and for a ghastly second it looked as though Jensen would throw her off him, but he didn't, too grimly intent, it seemed, on not actually vomiting on the floor. Gen looked up at Jared, bit her lip and said the last thing any of them wanted to hear. "We should contact the clinic."

 

 

Jensen spat out a denial, protested that he was fine, that there was nothing wrong with him that a rest wouldn't fix, the fear in his eyes palpable and overwhelming like he thought two extra months before he went in might provide an answer, might give him a way out, and Jared wanted to just leave him alone, let him do this, but he couldn't. Even after everything he couldn't. In a daze he called the clinic and they instructed him coldly to bring Jensen in on the double, censured him for his deceit and reminded him of the potential legal consequences of his actions if this all went wrong. He couldn't bring himself to give a shit though, he just needed to know that they could take the pain away from Jensen even if it hastened the inevitable.

 

 

Jensen fought them as they took him out to the car, but then he'd never really stopped fighting them in his own way, and Jared, who had never believed in any afterlife, thought that there might be a special hell waiting for them after this. They flicked the car to automatic and held Jensen between them, as though the predicament had temporarily lifted any barrier between them, and that he didn't fight as though this at last wasn't the worst thing that could happen, as though he’d take any comfort where he could get it. Towards the end he looked at them with fever-bright eyes and Jared reminded him not to say a word about what had happened. Jensen smiled at that, a twisted awful thing.  “I fooled you didn't I?" he whispered, and it was like a mask had fallen over his face, everything he'd become disappearing until he was the Omega that they'd bought in the first place.

 

The air was tense and heavy as they made their way into the clinic, Jensen trailing behind by one step as though it offered even the most meagre amount of protection, already white and shaking, not just ill it seemed but heartsick to the core. Jared saw Gen drop back discreetly to lend an arm, though it off balanced them both; and Jensen didn't shrug her off but allowed it for the moment. Robin was at the front desk, and there were two presumable doctors at his side, in sterilized white coats and masks, who unhooked Jensen from Gen's arm and carried him off without any ado or discussion.

 

It turned out in the end that it was mild enough, could be fixed there and then. Robin who seemed to have appointed himself their sole connection with the clinic- there were no more little chats with Franzie - told them with no apparent disappointment that they'd had a choice to go ahead with the birth early anyway, but decided that full development was more important. "Of course that's good news for you guys," he added, "but that doesn't mean that you didn't do something very stupid. Denying Jensen appropriate medical care could have been lethal to the foetus.”

 

After he’d told them the good news, Robin took them to a small, comfortable room with only two chairs and propped himself up against the desk to stare at them thoughtfully. "I'm surprised that you of all people ignored the terms of our agreement," he said, as though turning a thought over slowly. There was nothing left of the affable, cheerful man who had guided them through this process, as though they had somehow qualified themselves to see behind that mask. "Why didn't you inform us of the pregnancy?"

 

Jared spoke up then because he could see Gen was caught in the glare of the obvious questions; he switched on whatever charm he had, and interlaced his hands together as though nervous (that at least he didn't need to fake). "It's a few things," he said carefully, gauging every flicker of reaction that passed across Robin's face. "I'm terrified of doctors." That was hardly an anomaly; weakness, death and age weren't spoken of without disgust, and those who chose to minister in such a capacity weren't mentioned. Most towns employed trained medics who could deal with accidents, broken limbs and the like, but with most illnesses wiped out long ago, the need for specialists had almost vanished. People unfortunate enough to require the services of a doctor kept that quiet. Doctors had contact with those who had rare diseases, the incurables with the vanishingly rare genetic disorders that hadn't been bred out or altered in gene therapy for whatever reason. Who would want to rub shoulders with people who spent their time like that?

 

Jared continued, every word calculated for maximum impact, but coming easier to him now. "My grandmother miscarried." That bit is the truth, his grandmother had been part of that final generation who carried their own children, though both Robin and Gen flinched a little at the sound of the word he’d used. "She was one of the last. I wanted to know everything was safe," it was coming so easily now he'd almost convinced  _himself_  that he wasn’t lying his ass off. He shrugged his shoulders ruefully and hoped that Robin wasn't going to call him out on the lies he was spinning. "We came as soon as we realized that Jensen needed care, and we're so sorry that we didn't come sooner. Don't blame Gen though, this is just one of my mistakes not hers," and it was that last bit that seemed to convince Robin. He relaxed himself, and unfolded from the desk.

 

"You behaved stupidly." The statement was matter of fact and Jared wondered if he was imagining the flat quality of the words as though there was some inflection of opinion that they'd missed. Regardless, Robin had clearly given them the benefit of the doubt- neurotic and stupid, he might be judging them, but not malicious and not knowing, and the tension in the room dissipated. “But no harm done in the end. Jensen’s supplements weren’t quite up to scratch it seems. The baby is healthy though, and we’ve scheduled Jensen to be induced in seven weeks time. That should give you adequate time to make all necessary arrangements.” He didn’t need to add anything else. Necessary arrangements - like buying a crib, notifying their friends and relatives of the happy event and acquiring a headstone for the garden.

 

Gen spoke up, recovered from her temporary discomposure. “Can we bury him at home?”

 

There was the faintest flicker of something in Robin’s eyes that Jared couldn’t quite interpret, whether it was shock at the bluntness of the words or that the question was even asked. “We covered that in the initial contract,” he said smoothly. “I’m afraid that after the event, Omegas remain at the farm for a number of reasons including safety, preventing distress of the owners, and of course the biohazard risk associated. You’ll be busy with the new addition to your family anyway.” He dug into a pocket and palmed Gen a e-card with a link to a baby store. “I recommend them,” he said easily, “they do some beautiful things.”

 

A few more meaningless instructions and a box of supplements later, the three of them were in the car, and Jared noticed Jensen scratching idly at the two separate and distinct needle marks in his skin, sore and angry looking against the tan of his arm, and bit his tongue rather than say anything. It was Gen again who spoke up, crashed through the walls they’d erected around the subject and changed the game plan.

 

“There’s something wrong with that place,” she said, “I mean on top of the wrongness of this whole situation. We need to find out  _what._ ”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, feedback welcome.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With a huge massive thanks to plinytheyounger for her enthusiasm and her beta of this chapter - any mistakes that remain are entirely my own. 
> 
> **Additional content notes:** strong issues around bodily autonomy concepts, pregnancy, dehumanization.

 

It was easier said than done, but the three of them together worked harder than Jared thought he'd ever worked in his life with. A life was resting in their hands now, and he found himself becoming more intimately acquainted with the darker side of the world than he'd ever anticipated he would. Gen and Jensen were working just as hard, though as the days ticked onwards the strain began to tell on them both. Gen, already small, seemed to shrink in on herself, and Jensen, who by contrast was growing larger each day, began to pause for longer and longer, as though the last vestiges of hope were dying in him. Jared could feel the changes in himself as well - sometimes it felt like he hadn't slept in days, like he'd never sleep again, eyes sore and gritty, brain swimming with too much information, all of it useless.

 

He looked up and found that Jensen was nowhere to be seen. Gen was asleep on the sofa, unhappiness clearly marked in her face in a way he'd never seen it before on anyone, and he touched her shoulder lightly. She turned towards him a little but slept on, and Jared left to find Jensen. There weren't many places he could be. He wasn't surprised by finding him in the garden. Just sat next to him and stared at the same cracked stone slab that Jensen had fixed his gaze on. There was nothing to be said.

 

Jensen didn't seem inclined to talk. He could no longer fold himself as he used to do, his body stretched and changed, nothing of ease in his moments, but he leaned forward, eyes averted from the sky and from Jared. Perhaps Jared was intruding:,he stood up to leave, the heavy weight of guilt that he carried with him in the pit of his stomach lurching a little. Jensen spoke then.

 

"What will you do afterwards?"

 

Jared wanted to snap and protest that Jensen couldn't talk like that. He wasn't going to die, they were going to find a way to save him, but all the ready assurances and desperate pleas that leapt to his lips died there. Lying was pointless at this late stage.

 

"I don't know," he said. It was the most honest thing he'd ever said. He didn't know. He couldn't picture the days ahead. He knew he and Gen would hold together, give each other strength. He knew there'd be a baby but he couldn't picture it. The baby didn't belong in the picture, not in the way Jensen did. For a moment he outright hated the swell of Jensen's stomach, a terrifying bitter hatred that tasted ashy in his mouth, because he didn't hate the baby, he hated himself, more than he could ever say. Jensen was watching him, eyes dark and face set.

  


"Jared," he said, and it cost him visible strength to say. "You'll both have her."  It was the first time he'd ever used any term other than “it”, the first time he'd made a less than oblique mention of the cancer killing him from the inside. There was no tenderness in his voice, and he didn't even glance down. To Jensen, the baby was a tumor, and Jared was more grateful than he could say that he could muster the strength to not hate it with every fibre of his being.

  


"We won't have you," he said, like a stopper had been loosed from his tongue. "God, Jensen, we won't have you."

  


"You never had me," Jensen said."I need you to understand that. I was always my own. You have a piece of paper that says that I'm yours and a life interest in my body, but you don't get the rest."

  


It was a lie. They both knew that. Jensen wasn't made knowing the truth. He'd lived the twenty years of this body's shell without knowing that he wasn't a thing, that he wasn't there only to adore and be adored. They'd owned him in those months when Jensen had been unknowing, and Jared knew, deep inside himself, that even if Jensen hadn't become pregnant, that they would never have been forgiven for what they'd taken of him. That Jensen, with that pride cultured who knew where, could never look past the fact that they'd seen him like that. Seen him beg for more and treat them like kings for the scraps they gave.

  


"I'm sorry," he said, because he'll never understand what Jensen went through and he's grateful for that: even the thought of it made him sick to the bone.

 

Jensen nodded. He kicked at the ground, levered a  green plant out of the soil with his toes; a small act of destruction, the blind slaughtering the blind. "I forgive you," he said, and the word is archaic on his tongue. Old words. A sorry, an acceptance. But forgiveness -  Jared shuddered under it. When he went inside, he found Gen, and burroeds his head against her on the couch, felt her hand stroke his hair, and if he cried, only she knew and she'd never tell.

 

On the morning that marked precisely nine months from the time of conception the clinic had given them, Jared lay there and stared at the ceiling, bleak in the first shards of morning light. Gen mumbled and turned into his arm and Jared tried to feel something. Anything. But the heightened emotions of the last few months, that in this last week had been near  hysteria were gone, trapped under a pane of glass so Jared could look at them almost objectively.

 

The hinges of the door creaked and when he looked up, Jensen was there at the door, looking at them with shadowed eyes. The odd tableau lasted for a moment, before he slipped into the room Jensen hadn’t been in this room since the revelation, had stuck meticulously to his own. Why was he here now? When he saw Jensen’s eyes he understood. There was terror there, the look of a man who’d been handed the exact hour and the minute of his death. Here at the end he’d come back, to the only people he knew, another stone on them if they thought too closely. That at the end, he came back to them even as though familiarity was better than nothing at all. Better than being alone.

 

He settled, sitting on the edge of the bed. Gen woke up at the movement. “Jensen,” she said muzzily, eyelids already fluttering shut, and he smoothed back her hair, the first time he’d touched either of them in a long long time.

 

“Shh,” he murmured and Jared’s teeth ached from repressing the urge to touch him, to feel the warmth of his shoulder through the thin white t-shirt. To try telling him he wasn’t alone. Drifting in and out of sleep, he was almost sure that he felt a whisper soft brush against his hair. When he next woke, they were late, and as he and Gen dressed hurriedly, it struck him with a final brutal irony how ridiculous it was that they were rushing. Rushing to get there in time to kill off Jensen. He avoided looking at the car-seat for the baby. It seemed obscene to put Jensen next to it, as though when they drove one in, they’d drive a replacement out.

 

There was no music and no talk in the car. What was there left to be said? Jared had set the car to automatic, and tried not to look at the controls, seized by the overwhelming urge to wrench the car away from its allotted path, to drive and drive until they could escape. But his hands stayed on his knees. He didn’t know what he’d expected at this, the fatal juncture. For Jensen to refuse? To choose to die how he wanted and take the child that had cost him his life with him? How could they walk in there - how would nobody suspect that they weren’t taking a normal happy Omega to the fate that awaited them? Jensen had fooled them, and fooled the staff on his last visit, but the fear was carved so deep into his face now, that it was impossible to conceal. The clinic thought of everything though - a stretcher was being wheeled out to them, and Jensen, correct and thoughtful to the end, leant over and puked copiously and violently all over the gravel, his face wet and screwed up enough that no-one could tell what he was feeling apart from miserably sick.

 

They’d been told, right at the beginning in a handy pamphlet, that goodbyes were inappropriate, only disturbing to an Omega’s peace of mind and that any gestures should be limited to mild encouragement. So standing there awkwardly while Jensen was loaded on seemed to be precisely what they were expected to do, judging from Robin’s mild look of approval, as they took Jensen away.

 

“You guys are stoic,” he said as they watched the small convoy of attendants remove Jensen. “Much better than most people, I’m telling you. They’re not supposed to get attached, but it’s human nature I suppose.”

 

He didn’t know what he said to Robin, remembered only a thick dull grey cloud, and that at some point he’d laughed loudly at something Robin had said in response, autopiloting the conversation, while his stomach lurched in sickening thumps as though his body were revolting inside him the way Jensen’s was. When he tuned back in, Robin was leading Jared to the entrance, Gen nowhere in sight, presumably still talking to her caller whoever they might be. Jared knew this bit. Waiting on the chairs outside the delivery room until they were given their baby. Robin got him settled, with a few kind words and an offer of a cup of coffee.

 

“It won’t take long,” he said earnestly. “Not to disgust you with any details but we have the best tech here available. So just sit tight and before you know it you’ll be holding your baby.” He bustled off to get the coffee, and at that moment Gen appeared, heaving a gigantic breath and running towards him. Her face was a mess - tears staining her cheeks, a wild look on her face.

 

“Jared,” she said, and hung onto him with one hand, “Jared, we have to stop it.”

 

“Gen,” he replied wretchedly. “Gen, we can’t, sweetheart.”

 

She shook her head violently, “You don’t understand, we have to. I don’t have time to explain, but they’ve been lying to us. We need to get in there now.”

 

There was no one around to see them in the plush reception. He fumbled in his pockets, Nobody had smoked in decades, but he carried a lighter for the party piece value of it - real oil and all, an expensive affectation that was finally getting a chance to prove its use. It wasn’t exactly hard to set a small fire and he left it burning merrily in the reception, listened to the automated fire alarms going off before they ran through the staff door.

 

Behind the scenes was exactly as he’d expected. White and sterile and featureless. Gen barreled ahead of him, fear lending speed to her steps. A man in a white coat came out of a doorway, and on seeing them, raised his voice to shout. With an odd disconnected sensation, Jared saw his hands come up and swing, awkwardly, wildly, but enough to put the man on the floor and silent. He didn’t break stride, but began to hyperventilate inside. Striking someone else and hard enough to hurt was serious. Mandatory re-education serious, if they were wrong, then there could even be a reconditioning penalty - wiping the memory of the incident and replacing it with something benign. When a second person emerged, a slender woman in the same uniform, she turned and fled instantly.

 

Jared followed, hoping that wherever she was running to would take them to Jensen. Gen caught her up first and shouted into her terrified face, “Where’s the theatre?” She pointed to the double doors straight ahead.

 

She shrank back against the wall when she let her go. “You can’t go in,” she said, “they’re mid-Caesarean.”

 

Who knew what that meant; he guessed it was some term for the delivery. He caught Gen’s eyes and she nodded. There was still a chance. Perhaps, even if there wasn’t, Jensen wouldn’t die alone like this. They made it about two steps in, into a scene that looked like something out of a butcher’s nightmare - Jensen awake and the man above him digging into his insides, before security dragged them out before they even got close enough to be seen. Jared lashed out as much as he could, although Jensen was dead already, he knew that much. What had been sufficient against a doctor though was hardly enough now and he was easily restrained, saw Gen being held with arms pinned firmly to her sides.

 

“Jensen,” he shouted, and then Gen was there somehow, miraculously, clawing at the security guard’s face, breaking his concentration just enough that Jared could wriggle loose, even as Gen was dragged away again. He threw himself through the door and Gen lashed out, trying to create as much disturbance as she could.

 

“Get him out of here,” the masked man said. “He’s not sterile, and I need to close this one up.”

 

There was a baby in the man’s hands now, or at least some red and pink thing Jared thought was a baby, and still Jensen was conscious, eyes a little dulled but open and present - and the doctor was going to close him up - did they do that to the dead? He dodged round towards him - the doctor wasn’t going to touch him and the security guards seemed as vulnerable to the thought of death on a table as anyone else in the world.

 

“Come on Jared,” Robin said. “I think it’s time to stop the games.” He opened the door and gestured towards it. “There’s nothing you can do here, I assure you.”

 

“I’m not leaving here until you come clean about what’s going on,” he said. “Fuck your sterile environment.”

 

“Well really the only person you’re hurting is Jensen,” Robin said with a shrug. “You’re an infection risk just by existing.” He paused a moment as though to watch Jared wrestle with the puzzle that posed. “What I’m saying here Jared is that Jensen’s alive and he’s likely to stay that way if you’re not too much of a fool. Now come on, out of there.”

 

With a final backwards look at Jensen, Jared left, felt a released Gen run forward to meet him. There was nothing he could do - and if Robin was telling even a sliver of the truth...

 

“How can you do this?” he demanded, the instant he was out. “He’s so young and you’re destroying him. You’re treating him worse than an animal.”

 

"How old do you think he is?" Robin asked, and there was genuine curiosity to his voice. "Twenty? Twenty two? He's thirty five actually. Older than either of you. This is the third time he's done this."

 

He could feel nothing but the clutch of Gen's fingers on his arm, everything else a haze. He fought for a breath, to keep standing. The _third_ time Jensen had done this? The third child he'd had?

 

Robin interpreted their silence as the shock it was, and smiled, a thin little smile that belonged just right on his face, nothing benign about it now. "Surprised?"

 

Gen said it for them both. "How? If one child kills them?"

 

"Because it doesn't," Robin said patiently as though explaining it to someone very young. "The original clones suffered from just that problem of course. The Omegas who birthed you two did indeed die after birth. The shock, the trauma, whatever it was. But it was never built in. There was a certain amount of obsolescence of course. They never could fix the cell degeneration of the earlier clones. They live as long as the lifespan of their original source. Jensen's source was 32 when he shared his DNA, and he wasn't healthy. There never was much time."

 

Jared could feel the sickness clawing its way up his throat. "But, why?" he said.

 

Robin looked mildly surprised. "Oh come now Jared," he said, and gestured with his head to the door. "Come on both of you. Come look."

 

They retraced the steps that had led them to this place in the beginning. Along the corridor. The _children_ at their playbooks. Then the others, the empty room where they'd seen the Omegas playing with themselves and each other, enthusiastic and happy. It was empty at the moment, clearly not ready for visitors.

 

"Do you understand?" Robin said. "Do you _understand_ how expensive it is to raise a clone? Eighteen years minimum of feeding and training and even schooling such as it is, plus the costs of technology so complex that you wouldn't understand it if I spent years explaining it to you. How much money do you think we make off one sale? But take one sale and times it by four. Then you begin to understand how it can be profitable."

 

"Profitable to resell a person," Jared said blankly.

 

Robin scoffed, an involuntary contraction of contempt on his face. "You two were the usual type. I could tell from the moment you walked in the door you know? We get people like you all of the time. Like to think themselves just a little bit more empathic, a little bit _different_ from the general population. But you're so desperate for that baby, just like everyone else and you don't care how you get it. You didn't ask any questions did you? Didn't ask how it was done, or what it meant. Probably never considered it."

 

Everything he said was true, every word of it hit at Jared. Robin had led them all the way back round to the office,  where they'd first signed the papers, and gestured to a seat. "This must be a little shocking," he said soothingly, "but there's no problem. No difficulty. You're not the first to find out, and you won't be the last. There's a couple like you every few years. They get suspicious, get attached. Try seeing behind the scenes, and they don't like what they find."

 

"You're _lying_ ," Gen cut in, "you're lying. If other people had found this out, we'd know. There'd be a national scandal. Everybody would have heard what you're doing."

 

There wasn't the slightest flicker in the placid beam Robin was directing at them. "Nonsense," he said. "Complete nonsense. You didn't hear, because every single one of them decided to take the generous package we offered them. Every one. You'll take it too because you can't afford not to. Now here's the deal, take it or leave it.  You leave here. You take the baby with you. If you want, you can have Jensen as well. He was getting near the end of his working life - the anti-aging shots take care of his face, but he's had three children, he's a little bit worn out. So have him. We're generous. You might even want to risk that second child with him."

 

"No," Jared said, without a second thought, and beside him Gen nodded. "No. Jensen wouldn't want that, and we don't either."

 

Robin held up a mild hand. "I haven't finished yet, hold yourself back. The second part of our offer is simple. You're the barrier between the human race and extinction. Because we hold the biggest card here. Not a single thing you can say will change the fact that every woman in this country is barren. There's only one way to have a child. Only one way and this clinic and every clinic like it holds the key. You go public and we'll face inconvenience. Public outrage even. There might be some people who try and burn us down or 'free' our products. But when they realize that without us, there _are_ no more children, that without us to facilitate it, there are no more Omegas, no more births, I think the tune will change pretty fast."

 

“Jesus,” there was a world of sick realization in Jared’s voice, and he could hear the beginnings of resignation.

 

“You’re not the only ones,” Gen said. “Your technology isn’t impossible to replicate, no matter what you say. We’d find a way.”

 

“Well, actually you won’t,” Robin replied. “You still don’t understand. How do you feel when you see a cut? Jared, what did you feel on seeing Jensen throw up outside?” He didn’t need to wait for their answers. “Sick, I suppose. That’s the benefit of our society. We're all scared of death, scared of age and illness and disease, because you don't come face to face with it anymore. But nearly every single cure, every single thing that keeps you healthy and young is inbuilt into your genes now by people who have been dead for a very long time. Where exactly are they coming from, these people you talk about who'll fix it all and find a cure? You can't even bandage a cut without fainting from the sight of blood." There was more than truth to what he said, there was an undeniable certainty, the arrogance of someone who didn't have to lie to deliver his point.

 

He stood up now and spread his hands as though imploring them to see things his way. "It's economics," he told them earnestly. "Pure economics - supply and demand at it's very simplest and most Keynesian. A beautiful and clean concept. Any biologist you can find in this country, anybody who even knows what the letters in DNA stand for is working for us, was head-hunted when they came out of school and very very carefully selected."

 

"Do you understand now?" he said, and circled back round to his chair. "You're not fighting against what you'd call evil. You're fighting against every single person in this country who created and allowed this to happen. You're fighting society, and may I say, the best of luck with that. Maybe afterwards you can solve corruption, or the war in Antarctica."

 

"So we just take our baby and go," Jared said numbly.

 

"Yes," Robin said. "You can have Jensen like I said as well.”

 

Jared didn’t dare look at Gen. Even his relief that Jensen wasn’t dead, that there was a chance to make all this right, wasn’t enough to bring anything but a momentary lightening, quickly swallowed up by darkness again.

 

Jensen's face when he saw them was a study in contrasts - he looked five years older than he had before he went in, closer now to his real age of thirty five - and Jared still couldn't imagine that Jensen was older than either of them. He wished he could have stomached asking Robin more questions now, but already, slowly, he was beginning to piece them together. The food, the vitamin injections, Jensen's self medication - anti-aging drugs pumped into his system, designed to keep him looking young. All of it a seamless process, all of it planned to the smallest degree, and because people wanted more _money_.

 

Jensen hesitated before he climbed into the car, and Gen spoke for the first time since they'd met him outside the building. "I'm sorry," she said, and Jared couldn't remember if they'd said it to Jensen before, straight as that. Whether they'd hidden behind their own guilt and expected it to be obvious that they regretted it.

 

Jensen nodded. "I'm coming home with you," he said quietly. "But I don't want to see her." It was the first thing, Jared thought numbly, that he'd ever really asked for. Not to see his daughter's face. He wasn’t looking at the front of the car where Gen was holding the baby in her arms.

  


"Of course," he said. The house had once seemed so big for just two people - it seemed to be shrinking around them. With Jensen in his old room, he wouldn't be able to hear the baby in their room  cry at night even. It felt real all of a sudden. Jensen wasn't dead, they had their daughter, And but nothing was fixed or right. There was silence in the car the whole way back. Jared couldn't help glancing back, the jarring sight of Jensen in Jared's clothes meeting him each time, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, the dip of the shirt revealing only clean bare skin instead of the metal of the tracker. Round his wrist was the ident bracelet the clinic had provided for free, so he could pretend he was a real human, someone who had a past and maybe even a future. He looked like any other person.

  


When they got back, Jensen disappeared up the stairs slowly – his fingers still pressed against his abdomen like movement hurt, and when Jared looked in on him an hour later, he was lying on his bed, facing the wall, the same sprawled posture of defeat that he’d had when they’d thought he would die. In their own room  the crib his mother had made and used for him – actual wood, padded with soft blankets.Gen was staring down at the baby in her moses basket downstairs. Jared folded his arms around her, pulled her closer and buried his face in her hair, tried not to break down. From now on they couldn’t afford to do that together.

  


“Should we ask my mother to take the baby?” he said quietly. “You know she’d be happy to look after her for a bit until we get things sorted here.”

  


Gen pulled away, and wiped the tears off her face. “She’d have to fight my Uncle Matthew for the privilege,” she said. “I don’t know Jared, I don’t know. We have to sort this sometime. We can’t hide her, but we can’t throw her at Jensen either. Sending her away isn’t going to fix the problem forever.”

 

He squatted down next to the baby and stared at the tiny crumpled face, couldn’t restrain all the ugly messed up thoughts that went through his head and horrified him; had it been worth it? The baby made the barest snuffle, and Jared felt himself begin to shake apart where he sat. She didn’t even have a name yet. He and Gen had never spoken of possibilities, not even in the darkest of nights in the quietest of voices, never betrayed themselves quite that far -, and now she was here without a name, without anything, with parents who could barely even think about her, and a carrier who couldn’t even bear to see her face.

 

Of course life went on. The clinic had been very thorough with their preparations, and the baby latched onto the tiny bottle just fine, drank and went back to sleep with every appearance of no great distress. The first few days were a blur – Jensen rarely came out of his room except at night when he could be sure that the baby was in Jared and Gen’s room – Jared could hear him make his way down the stairs, quietly and carefully, hear the faint clink of spoon against bowl, walked in more than once on Jensen at the table, head bent forward onto his hand, back a straight line of despair. He was looking older still now that the injections had been ceased, and that he ate the regular food that Gen and Jared ate, though his body was mostly the same. Jared had seen the smooth expanse of his belly, the clearness of it, not a sign to indicate that he’d had one baby let alone three. He tried not to think of those other two babies, of the other two families that’d had Jensen like this, and he wondered if Jensen ever did.

 

They’d told him most of it of course. That the clinic erased the past couple of years from his brain each time and put him back in the play-pen – and it still sounded the stuff of one of the vids Jared wrote for, a wild outlandish possibility despite the fact that that kind of brain modification had been around for decades - used by therapists, the justice system, and as an illegal panacea for people who just wanted to forget. Overwriting memories with a blank slate so new thoughts could grow.  Jensen had taken the blow steadily, absorbed the knowledge that at least ten years of his life were missing with enviable calm, as though one more gutpunch couldn’t rock his equilibrium anymore,. The only thing that Gen and Jared fought over in near silent whispers in their room alone at nights, was whether to tell him about the faulty genetics of the man he’d been cloned from - it didn’t matter how young Jensen looked, it was what inside that counted after all.

 

When Jensen had cornered them both in the living room one night, the baby down for her nap and spoke to them - actually spoken to them - more than polite nothings or murmured acknowledgements of the horrors they were telling him, the veils they were drawing back on a life that had never been his own, the secrets they’d uncovered about his own body, known by them first always, Jared had already known what it would be about. The thought had been looming large in his own mind for days, each time maniacally squashed back as though not thinking about it would make it somehow impossible.

  


“I want,” he said, “I want to do something to stop them.”

  


“The contract,” Jared heard himself say as though to stave off the inevitable for just a second longer, “we signed a contract agreeing to their terms.”

  


“Screw the fucking contract,” Gen said, and her face was still and white. “What the hell can they do to us? What can they take?”

  


Jared looked at them both and pictured a future without children – he had no doubt that the farms would cease production as soon as the news went public. There’d be mass panic. He could guess how many people, how many couples would hate them, would rather they’d kept their mouths shut. He could guess how the farms would trot out the lowest classes of Omega that they’d created – the C’s and D’s who barely understood anything at all, parade them in front of the public and ask them _are they one of you_? Are they human? And like cattle conditioned to view physical perfection - no aging, a superior gene pool as the only criteria of humanity - talk of souls was old fashioned after all - used to an artificial separation between their property and themselves would they even see?

 

What was the alternative though? Staying silent and letting it happen, not even trying to make it stop? He looked at Jensen, and then at Gen, caught in the beat between moments, “nothing,” he said. “Nothing of any value.” Trying to smile, he went on. “I think we’re going to have to hole up somewhere though for when the hordes come after us. And we need a game plan. We need a way to let people know without them shutting us up.”

 

“Newspapers,” Jensen said immediately, still stuck in a past he only knew about through books. “Or radio.”

 

“Have you ever seen a newspaper?” Gen asked. “There’s not really anything like that anymore. Not enough people willing to pay for it. Radio’s not really a thing anymore either. It’s going to have to be online, and none of us have the skills for that.”

 

Jared leapt in, mind working overtime at solutions. “Adrianne found the links,” he said slowly, “found that every farm is owned by the same conglomerate under different names. They’re all connected. Presumably the government farms are run by the same people as well but nominally owned by the government,” he hesitated for a moment, unwilling to talk about production and statistics, about the conclusions that could be drawn with only a little thinking - the government didn’t supply many Omegas but they did supply an awful lot of babies.  There were all sorts of consequences to even imagining the inevitable process behind that supply. He shied away from the inevitable thought, tried to take refuge in the idea that they’d probably stuck with the artificial wombs or the first generation Omegas, couldn’t quite make himself believe it.

 

There was an awkward pause, and Jensen supplied the answer to the unspoken words. “You can talk about it Jared,” he said, an almost unbearable blankness in his voice as though he were fighting hard to keep anything from showing, and Jared wondered again  exactly what had been in the silver foil bags that Jensen had consumed, whether they’d been designed to keep him at least a little placid and pliable and happy, and now the real Jensen was emerging - irritable, less balanced, angry in ways that he couldn’t even articulate, still the same person in fundamentals but less blurred by convenience. “I know what I am, I’m not squeamish about hearing it.”

 

Gen reached out to touch his hand and then stopped as though she’d been burned, as though reminded that neither of them had the right to touch Jensen again. “You’re human Jensen, that’s what you are.”

  


Jared finished the sentiment off with, “not that that’s exactly a compliment these days I guess,” and watched with the now familiar aching tug in his chest as Jensen reluctantly smiled, creases around his eyes appearing for a second before they got back to business, as though for a moment their work had been forgotten. Jared met Gen’s eyes for a second and saw the same forlorn tug in them that he knew was mirrored in his own. Whatever feelings they’d developed before they knew about Jensen weren’t going away, only deepening as he proved himself again and again to be more than they could have ever anticipated.

  


They went back to their schemes, Jared and Gen taking the lead on how they were going to get the word out, excited and uncertain at the possibilities that were endlessly opening up, not allowing themselves to even contemplate how radically they and Jensen were going to change the world, for better or for worse. They were calling the baby Sally for now, after Gen’s grandmother, taking shifts to care for her, slipping out to do it because the one thing Jensen showed no sign of changing on was seeing her. Jared couldn’t pretend to understand it when his own heart seized with protectiveness and fondness each time he saw her, but the prospect of bringing it up was one that braver men would have quailed from, given the circumstances.

  


It had taken several bottles of wine and talking long into the night to tell Adrianne the whole story - she’d taken the weekend off to come down and visit them, cashing in on their promise to give her all the answers after she’d found the missing link for them that had enabled them to piece together what was happening. She’d put most of it together herself but the details they passed on had her astounded and practically speechless for the first time in their friendship. Over the next few weeks, they began to put together a gameplan, utilising every one of Adrianne’s less savoury contacts gleaned through her work.

  


Adrianne was friendly to Jensen - who she’d only met in the environment of a police cell before - but clearly more interested in the system behind him than the individual faces affected by it, grilling him with all the preciseness that her career afforded about everything he remembered. They’d figured out from piecemeal discussions that Jensen remembered his first eighteen years at the clinic- neither Jared nor Gen ever probed too closely about that time, though neither of them forgot the enthusiastically cavorting Omegas they’d seen - and that there was a long blank before he’d been taken by Jared and Gen, a blank he’d never questioned because he’d never known it wasn’t normal.

 

Adrianne had no such reservations about asking questions, and it was with an emotion that Jared recognised with a mild shock was jealousy, that he listened to how easily she asked the things he’d never dare to - and how fluently Jensen answered, as though these were things he’d gnawed over at night and never spoken of. It didn’t help that the more they spoke, the more they warmed up to each other, Adrianne departing from her usual clinical approach to an interview, and Jensen meeting her every inquiry with a quick answer. It was like a wash of cold water down his spine when Jared realized that these might well be the first real conversations Jensen had  ever had with someone who wasn’t Jared or Gen, and like the tide, inevitable and forever, the guilt followed behind it, like something he was never ever going to be able to stop.

 

He left them there with Jensen recounting every detail that he could remember of the testing procedures used by the farm, and ducked into the kitchen to get Sally’s bottle. Gen was in there, another bottle of wine in hand, and he watched her shoulders, narrow and tense as she struggled with the opener. “I’ll come in with you,” she said, and followed him in to watch as he fed Sally.“Do you think,” she said suddenly, and Jared tensed a little - these days hypothetical questions did that to him, each new horror day by day - and Sally blinked sleepy eyes at him as though disturbed for a moment from her drink. “Do you think that if they hadn’t done this,” - no need to specify who ‘they’ were - “that they’d have fixed the fertility problem?”

 

It was a question Jared knew, that neither of them would ever be able to answer, perhaps something they didn’t even want answered. So he didn’t say anything in return, just gazed back down at Sally. When he looked up Jensen was by the door, looking in at them for a long moment, before he went back to the living room. Adrianne, for her part, was on fire with enthusiasm, like she’d been waiting her whole life for a cause like this: something to throw every bit of her considerable acumen behind, a mine of resources and possibilities that almost tired Jared out just contemplating. She was looking at Jensen now, with earned respect, untempered by the friendly pity she’d had on first meeting him, and Jared felt a new vista opening up - one that had been merely a possibility before. That Jensen could leave when they were done here. Could leave and find new people to belong to - to live with he corrected himself firmly.

 

Jensen went to bed at some obscene time in the morning, Jared heard him pad past the door like usual, and then stop, and unwillingly remembered the look in Jensen’s eyes when he’d looked at them earlier, an unreadable mess of emotions, but predominant above all else, the resignation that, had he looked for it, seemed to have been stamped on Jensen’s face for a long time. Like he wasn’t at the end of his ordeal, but the start of a new one. Jared turned it over and over in his mind: not just the fear, the sinking fear that they’d fail and it would all be for nothing, but the knowledge that Jensen was going to carry the bulk of this on his shoulders. And that there was never going to be an end. The furore would never stop, a new type of cage built of questions and curiosity and no doubt prurient interest locking Jensen in as securely as a contract ever had - and Jared and Gen alongside him.

  


The next morning, he slid out without disturbing Gen and checked on Sally before padding down to the kitchen for some coffee. Adrianne was up already, chatting quietly with someone on her palm, nodding briefly as she saw him as she gestured towards the coffee. Thankfully he knocked most of a cup back and she made a one second motion as he headed out the door. “Jared,” she said, as the call ended, “I have to head back today, but before I go, I need to know. Are you all committed, all of you to this? It can be done without you if that’s what you need. But this is the last chance to say no.”

 

She was offering him an out, he knew that. It wasn’t that he didn’t think Jensen was strong enough to stand it alone - that would be as far from the truth as anything could be, but they’d forfeited that right a long time ago, the right to wash their hands of this. They were here to the end. “Yeah, I’m sure,” he said and she raised a cup in solidarity.

 

“Good. You’re lucky you live so far out you know. You’re going to need a police perimeter - stock up on everything, and be ready to leave at a moment’s notice.” None of it was new, just Adrianne checking in on all the things they’d talked about, given a new immediacy by the brightness of the morning outside. It was becoming real under their hands and their words. She hesitated for a second then ploughed on. “Jared, you should send Sally somewhere safer. If this goes wrong, hell if it goes the way we think it’ll go, she could be at risk.” She didn’t say what both of them knew, the stick that Sally would become on their backs - how Jared and Gen had their own baby and yet were fine denying everyone else the chance. She didn’t mention how Sally threw Jensen off, the deep fissure of what she represented without even meaning to, but she didn’t have to.

 

Jared looked at his hands. “I think she should stay with us,” he said, and Gen chimed in on that from the doorway, cradling Sally on her shoulder.

 

“She’s as big a target for people who’ll want to hurt us anywhere else. We can’t put our families under that kind of risk.”

 

Adrianne nodded.“Do you want Jensen to stay with me instead then? Split the fire up a little bit.”

 

“No,” Jensen broke in from the front room, and Jared realised he must have been there for most of his discussion with Adrianne. He stood, his arms crossed across his chest, the skin on them less tan now, the muscles more defined though, as Jared remembered apropos of nothing, Jensen had always been strong. “I’m staying. I’ll have to adjust.” He walked into the kitchen, and from force of habit gathered the cups up from the table before Adrianne silently whisked them out of his hands, always a fan of putting into practice what she espoused in theory. He was closer now to Sally than he’d been since presumably the moment she’d been cut out of him, and Jared tried not to hope that there’d be something there.

  


A blanket of quiet fell over the kitchen, Adrianne stared down at her palm as though that’d give them some space, and Sally squirmed in Gen’s arms, just about gearing up for a fretful yell. Gently, as though he was afraid of breaking her, he patted her on the cheek for a brief second and looked at her properly. Jared didn’t dare look at Jensen’s face, though he could see Gen couldn’t look away. Tried not to think about the two other children out there in the world with a bit of Jensen’s DNA, who’d never know who he was.

 

“She’s not mine,” Jensen said, and there was a world of relief in his voice, as though a load had been lifted off his back.“I thought she’d feel like a part of me.” He patted her cheek again, a brief impersonal sort of touch, and Jared got it, however much it hurt. Sally wasn’t Jensen’s. He’d been afraid he’d feel something, another sort of bondage, another unwilling tie that he couldn’t break, and now, freed from that fear, he turned away.

 

“We’re doing this,” Adrianne said. “All of us. No going back.”

 

It happened. It was later than they’d have liked perhaps but to make it stick they had to make it good. They pushed the button and the world exploded around them.

  


**Epilogue**

  


When the first news reports came in - panic and wrecking and disaster, thirty Omegas burnt to death in a botched rescue attempt from the outside -, Jared could barely even listen to it, could hardly imagine the chaos that they’d unleashed, the destruction of an entire carefully laid system. The amount of babies born dropped from a population- maintainable number to almost nothing over night; and those,deprived of their chance took their fury out on the people responsible. Jared wondered if their child would grow up used to the sounds of police shift change outside the house, bomb threats and hate. Some days he wondered if she’d be part of the last generation in their part of the world, because Robin hadn’t been bluffing or joking when he’d said that they would do everything in their power to maintain their grip.

 

He couldn’t say it didn’t crush them when the inevitable counter-arguments began circling - that it was all lies, that Jensen wasn’t an Omega at all, it was a sad hoax by sick people, and the endless parading of the most broken specimens that the clinics could find - or manufacture, an unsubtle reminder to the general public that surely they couldn’t be asked to extend humanity, autonomy, to things so patently unsuitable for it. Debates raged back and forth, a country of citizens dispersed by distance brought together by the simple and unalterable nature of the discussion. On the one hand - children, on the other - clear evidence of the way they were obtained.

 

The endless bleating cries insisting on peace above all else, were no small players. There was a fear that ran through the discourse, the fear of upset, of the violence that saturated the change, the endless oily potential of the harm that could be inflicted by too much knowledge too fast. For a population raised to worship a stale, recycled, arid peace, the consequence of a war that had stripped the fundamental drive from their population, until they believed the rituals of peaceful non-aggression, of violence punished with re-education and reconditioning.

 

There were endless meetings with government representatives who at first demanded, then asked and finally pleaded for them to just drop the case because they didn’t know what they were doing, the irreparable harm they were causing, that could never be fixed, and always, constantly, was the fear of assassination, the knowledge that the only thing that prevented it now was the difficulty of explaining their deaths in any way that didn’t bolster their cause.

 

Jared had known it would never end, but he could never have predicted the grinding monotony and fruitlessness of it all, the circular arguments and the ever present reality of what the long term future was. Occasionally he even felt guilty that revolution on a small scale was this boring. There was nothing productive they could do under what was being called protection but was in fact more like a twenty four seven house arrest. Under the circumstances, access to most things was cut off, but there were ways and means of keeping informed and the three of them made full use of them.

 

So it wasn’t long after the rest of the population that they heard the single most shocking statement of the last fifty years. Like an immense long dormant whale, the rest of the world was resurfacing around them, envoys were being sent, communications reopened on the rest of the world’s behalf, and like that, there was the possibility of war once again, a stick it was clearly hoped, that was large enough to beat Jensen, Gen and Jared back under their rock once more - the point of weakness showing enough, they were told, that like the mechanical shark Jared had been tasked with writing, artificial blood had been scented. It was Jensen who told them to go fuck themselves, that the stick still wasn’t big enough.

 

It was with the quietness of winter snow that the whole business came tumbling down, ruined beyond repair, the money pointless, the power dissipated by the light of day, when with the gentle, deliberate timing of a perfect kill, the knowledge became public property that most of the rest of the world had sorted out that little problem on a case-by-case basis some decades back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback is very much appreciated.


End file.
